


Nic and Gil's Weekly Wine Hour

by Plenoptic



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Friends to Lovers, It Does Not, M/M, Machiavellian pining, Multi, Threesomes, Volpelli, Volpelli endgame, googles whether it even counts as slowburn if there are only two chapters, like a couple of threesomes, slowburn sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-20
Updated: 2020-01-24
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:07:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 25,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22326073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Plenoptic/pseuds/Plenoptic
Summary: Their weekly, then bi-weekly, then tri-weekly ritual involves wine, and chess, and some complaining about the emptiness of their beds. And then Volpe comes to him with a proposition.Had to bump up the rating for ch 2, w h o o p s
Relationships: Machiavelli/la Volpe/some cute ladies, Niccolò Machiavelli/ La Volpe/ Tessa Varzi, Niccolò Machiavelli/La Volpe
Comments: 4
Kudos: 36





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Recently enjoyed ObsidianButterfly's absolutely kickass Machia/Volpe/Reader fic, "The Assassin and the Thief," which got all these gears turning. I'm not really a fan of the reader insert genre but I thought it was fucking excellent and well worth a read and some kudos. 
> 
> Volpelli is still endgame here though because I am who I am as a person.
> 
> also I'm low-key obsessed with Tessa Varzi

At some point between Venice and Savonarola, Machiavelli began drinking with la Volpe. It was a little perfunctory, at first, a matter of course—they were working together to cut the head from the serpent that held all of Italy in the clutches of its coils, after all. They had to trust one another. A little wine in the evening was an easy way to build camaraderie.

Machiavelli did not expect to come to like it, to even look forward to the nights, twice a week, when Volpe would join him in his Signoria office, or when he would trek across the Ponte Vecchio to seek the thief in his hideout. For all his bragging about his self-made wealth and his lowly birth, Volpe had a nobleman’s palate for wine, knew all the great vintages of the last century and where to procure them. For Niccolò, whose statesman’s salary didn’t usually permit such luxuries, the treat was rare indeed, and appreciated.

They talked while they drank, sometimes played chess or liar’s dice. Machiavelli tended to win the former, la Volpe the latter. Try as he might, Machiavelli couldn’t parse the thief’s tells. They played hazard when their minds and bodies were weary and they had no head for strategy.

La Volpe, of course, didn’t reveal much of himself—he managed to carry hours’ long conversations without so much as a mention of his birthplace or family or anything of his life at all before he’d emerged, apparently fully formed, as the Fox of Florence. Machiavelli, on the other hand, found himself opening up quickly to the wily older man. He spoke often of his father, less of his mother, whose love he’d always struggled a little to understand; he spoke of his siblings, and when he found himself speaking with difficulty of his elder sister’s recent death, Volpe even reached across the table between them and placed a hand on his arm. The touch seemed to linger a little, though perhaps Machiavelli only imagined it.

Perhaps his time and energy were better invested in Ezio, who needed all of their attention if he was to be mentor one day—and Niccolò was sure that was the plan, knew beyond a doubt that his time as the brotherhood’s leader was temporary. Ezio was the more charismatic and better skilled—he was just too green, his wounds too fresh and too deep still. He didn’t have the head for it yet, and Machiavelli did. That was all there was to it.

But Machiavelli was still just twenty-three then, and he felt the rawness of his youth very acutely when he and Volpe talked and drank in those stolen evening hours. He couldn’t begin to hazard a guess at the thief’s age—thirty-five? Forty? Older? Younger?—but Volpe spoke with the calm self-assurance of a man who had seen and done much in the years he’d lived. He was coolly rational, almost absurdly level-headed, and he didn’t permit Niccolò’s niggling anxieties to run away with him.

Which wasn’t to say that their liaisons, such as they were, were all business. If anything, they mostly stole those hours to forget their lives a little, to pretend to be nothing more than comrades—yes, friends even—sharing good wine. Some nights Machiavelli’s head throbbed and he endured the thief’s teasing and only took water; other nights, Volpe sauntered to his office with a bottle of brandy, and they passed the hours that much more pleasurably.

One night, perhaps a year into their little ritual, Volpe nursed his third glass of wine and looked at Machiavelli with a wicked smile that crinkled his eyes at the corners. His eyes were not, as the legends had it, violet, nor royal purple, nor any other impossible color, but a burnished, coppery brown that mirrored the reddish undertones of his hair. His eyes were, in Machiavelli’s professionally honest opinion, rather lovely. But he only knew because Volpe had finally begun taking down his hood when they were together, and Machiavelli neither missed nor took for granted that great mark of trust between them.

“What?” Machiavelli queried, knocking his boot against the thief’s. They were comfortably stretched out before the fire in Volpe’s hideout, sunk deep into chairs too luxurious for their otherwise humble settings.

“Tell me something.”

“Only ask.”

“Do you prefer women or men?”

Machiavelli looked at him in surprise, but Volpe’s face was sincere, his eyes guarded. Niccolò took a drink of his wine before he answered.

“Is it only one or the other?”

A slow grin spread across the thief’s face. “Everything is permitted.”

They clinked their glasses together, and Machiavelli smiled. “Then I am not discriminating.”

“Nor am I.” And wasn’t that a relief for Machiavelli, a great weight he hadn’t even realized hung about his shoulders, to speak of such things so easily with another man who felt the same. Volpe’s friendship was a treasure indeed. “Tell me about women.”

Machiavelli lifted his head and cocked a brow. “Women?”

“Yes. About a woman you’ve loved.”

“Oh.” Machiavelli shifted in his seat. There had been women, of course, but he hadn’t expected so honest and direct a question. But he liked that Volpe still surprised him.

“You do enjoy women, don’t you?”

“Yes. Don’t all men? Excepting the Leonardos of the world, and men of the cloth.”

Volpe snorted through his nose. “Men of the cloth like women, perhaps more than anyone else.”

“Fair enough.” Machiavelli tipped his head back against his seat; the wine was beginning to make his head swim. He’d pulled his shoulder earlier in the week, and drinking was the only thing so far that had eased the lingering pain. “There was a girl, when I was sixteen. Maria.”

“Bah.” Volpe waved a hand. “I’ve no interest in love between children.”

“There was no love between us. I pined for her desperately, and I don’t think she knew my name.” Machiavelli smiled, lacing his hands on his abdomen. “She had golden hair and skin the color of fresh cream, and her laugh was like music. God, she was beautiful. I loved her to near madness, the way boys of sixteen do.”

“And what happened?”

“Oh, nothing. She was married a year later, and I forgot about her eventually.” It was sort of nice to think about Maria, though, to remember her fondly instead of with great, twisting pangs of emotional agony. “God, then there was Giulietta. She was a… Minerbetti, I think. All hips, that one, with glorious dark hair and a smile sharper than a knife. She was my first.”

Volpe chuckled. “You would like them sharp.”

“She was so damned clever—she used to make me laugh so hard I couldn’t stay upright. She was a little older than me, a year or two? Used to call me Machia and ruffle my hair before she’d make me go to my knees for her.”

“Niccolò Machiavelli likes forceful women! I’d never have guessed. What happened to her?”

“She grew bored of me eventually, ran away with some condotierro. I don’t know what ever became of her.” Machiavelli smiled into his wine, suddenly a little wistful. “I hope she is well.”

“And are there women now? Or men, perhaps, since we are not discriminating.”

Machiavelli sighed and stretched his legs, let himself sink languidly into the chair. He was tired. “I’ve been busy.”

“So have we all.” Volpe nursed his wine, gazing into the flickering fire. “I admit my bed feels a little lonely.”

For several pregnant moments, Machiavelli held his breath—he was sure a proposition was coming, and had genuinely no idea how he’d respond. But at length, Volpe heaved himself to his feet and patted Machiavelli’s knee, and said they had both better retire, before they were tempted to open another bottle. He had a special vintage in mind for next week’s visit.

* * *

They passed a few more months like that, amicably, before they spoke again of sex and the emptiness of their beds. Volpe badly twisted his ankle and was laid up for a week, and Niccolò visited him, entertained him with bawdy stories from the Decameron and lurid bits of gossip from the Signoria. They ate together and played chess; Volpe could win if he focused now, and Machiavelli was finally figuring out his tells when they played dice. There was a sepia-tinted softness to that week that Machiavelli found himself missing when Volpe was well enough to take to the rooftops once more.

Volpe visited him for the third time in a week in early May, just a few days hence since Machiavelli had turned twenty-four, and his head still pounded with the hangover from the night Volpe had given him as a gift, most of which he couldn't remember. Volpe found Machiavelli bent over his desk in the Palazzo della Signoria with ink all over his hands, writing out a lengthy report about the competing interests of two guilds in Florence whose rivalry may be leveraged for the Signoria’s benefit. It was a little dishonest, perhaps, for Machiavelli’s tastes, but then again, one of the guild leaders had spit in his face recently. Machiavelli wasn't dramatizing, the man had _literally_ spit in his face. The game in Florence was statesmanship, and if he couldn’t play, well. There would be other woodworker’s guilds, and his successor would likely learn to be more diplomatic.

“I have been thinking,” Volpe said, by way of announcing his presence, and set a large bottle of wine upon the desk, directly over Machiavelli’s report. The assassin frowned and pushed it back, tsk’d at the dark circle of condensation it left behind, smearing his ink. “About our lonely, empty beds.”

Machiavelli looked up at him. He felt exceptionally tired, more so than usual, and not up for their usual banter. “I have much to do, Volpe.”

“And wouldn’t a warm body in your bed tonight be a much more fitting reward than cold sheets,” Volpe said, almost _purred_.

Against his better judgement, Machiavelli’s interest was piqued. He sighed and sat back in his chair. “I’m listening.”

Volpe grinned. He looked more wolf than fox, and Machiavelli’s eyes narrowed. “I have a recruit.”

“Oh?”

“Tessa Varzi, of Pisa. She was originally one of Ezio’s, but I’ve taken a liking to her. She’s an adept poisoner, and I’ve never known such a menace to unwitting men’s pockets.” Volpe’s grin widened. He uncorked the bottle of wine and began to pour into the glasses that sat perpetually on Machiavelli’s desk. “Good with her hands, you see,” he added, very casually. Machiavelli grunted.

“And you mention her because…?”

“She likes you.” Volpe set the bottle aside and drew himself a chair, propping his feet on Machiavelli’s desk. Niccolò winced but didn’t deride him. “I overheard her telling another of my girls that she finds you handsome.”

“I’m flattered.”

“You were kind to her, as I understand it, when she injured herself on her first mission. She’s grateful.”

“Please tell her it was my pleasure to be of assistance.”

Volpe laughed. “Ever the diplomat.”

“I find diplomacy the safest ship in uncharted waters.”

“Meaning?”

Machiavelli leaned forward and folded his arms on the desk. “Meaning, I don’t know what you’re getting at here, _amico_.”

“Ah.” Volpe smiled and nudged Machiavelli’s wine glass toward him. Machiavelli took it, toasted him, and drank. “I’m not trying to arrange a marriage, so belay those fears. No, perhaps I merely see two of my dear friends unhappy, and think they could be of some comfort to each other.”

“If you’re telling me this Tessa plans to seduce me, I appreciate the warning,” Machiavelli snorted.

“You can be a little dense, you know, Machia,” Volpe said, his voice dropping to a near murmur, and Machiavelli felt the hair on the back of his neck rise. “Well. I suppose I haven’t given you all the relevant information.”

“Do go on, then.”

“As you wish. I should tell you, Tessa is a sweet thing, and capable, and she’s just turned nineteen. A little young for me, which is why I didn’t proposition her. I thought an invitation from her much older master would make her uncomfortable.”

“Very courteous of you, doing the bare minimum to assure her well-being.”

Volpe grinned. “Wasn’t it? Then you can imagine my surprise when she propositioned me, instead.”

Machiavelli arched his eyebrows. “A surprising development indeed. And did you accept?”

“With a provision.” Volpe lifted a finger. Absurdly, Machiavelli found himself wondering what it tasted like. “If she wants me to have her, I shall. But I would feel better if we were joined by someone she trusts. Perhaps someone who has already shown her kindness.”

Machiavelli stared, and Volpe stared back. At length, the thief’s grin widened, showing his teeth.

“Do you understand now, _amico_?”

“This is a proposition as well, then.”

Volpe shrugged noncommittally. “More of a courtesy call.”

“Oh? How so?”

“Well, as it so happens, Tessa was very much keen for either arrangement, the two or three of us together, and she is already at the hideout, waiting in my bed. For us.” When Machiavelli only continued to stare at him, Volpe added, “Right now.”

“Oh.” Machiavelli blinked. “ _Oh_.”

“Yes. So.” Volpe leaned across the desk and tapped Machiavelli’s report. “Would you say this is terribly important, or can it wait for tomorrow?”

* * *

When he kissed her, Machiavelli intended for it to be gentle, and he couldn’t mask a note of surprise when Tessa tangled her hands in his hair and pulled him sinfully close, pressing her hips into his and opening her mouth. From the other side of the room, Volpe chuckled, pouring himself a shot of brandy and bringing the glass to his smiling mouth while Machiavelli flailed a little under the intensity of Tessa’s attentions.

“She assures me she is no virgin,” Volpe said, voice laden with amusement.

“So I see,” Machiavelli mumbled, only barely getting free of Tessa’s questing lips. She went to her toes to chase his mouth, but he leaned back and planted his hands on her waist, forcing her back to the floor. “Tessa, are you sure?”

“Yes,” she said, almost breathed it, and her doe eyes gazing up at him were so lovely that Machiavelli’s chest constricted. “And Volpe has already made me wait.”

Machiavelli looked back at Volpe, who shrugged, as if to say “Told you so.” The assassin sighed and looked back down at the girl trembling in his arms. She certainly did seem eager, and Volpe had been right—she was a pretty little thing, very slight of stature, with dark hair that only fell to her shoulders and petal-pink lips that did look enticing in a pout. Machiavelli took her small hands in his and brought them to his mouth, kissing her knuckles.

“How many men have met their end in these delicate hands, _bella?”_ he asked, softly, and she grinned up at him.

“A score at last count, Mentor.”

“I hear poison is your weapon of choice.” He brought her hands to his chest, let her begin to untie the laces of his doublet. “Should I fear the next wine glass you hand me?”

“No, Mentor.” Her voice was almost a purr. She was good, he thought—very good. No blushing virgin, Tessa Varzi, though she certainly looked the part. “You have nothing to fear from me. And even if you did, I could make it so fast.” She smiled up at him. “Almost sweet.”

Machiavelli stared down at her. After a moment, he snorted and looked at Volpe. “Your apprentice knows how she would kill me.”

“I also know how I would kill you, Machia, but that didn’t stop you from coming.”

Machiavelli considered only a little longer—there wasn’t much to consider. He took Tessa’s sweet face in his hands and kissed her, curled his fingers through her dark hair, and her soft moan against his mouth was all the incentive he needed to back her toward the bed and drop her upon it. She landed on her elbows, legs splayed, and grinned up at him as he pulled off his doublet and undershirt before climbing over her. Volpe laughed.

Machiavelli hadn’t lied to the thief—it really had been some time since he’d had anyone in his bed. Tessa melted against him, her hands roaming his shoulders, his back, drawing him to her, and the sincerity of her desire was touching. She was sugar and cantarella both—sweet and powder-soft one moment, elusive and dangerous the next. Machiavelli had never considered her for a bedmate before, but only because she was an apprentice, and because he knew he scared the living hell out of most of their new recruits.

“Niccolò,” she murmured, and he shivered a little to hear his name spill from her mouth. He touched her lips, kiss-swollen, and claimed her mouth again. His hand fumbled with her shirt, finally pulling it open, and she sighed against his lips when his fingertips touched her breast, small and pert and round.

“Lovely,” came Volpe’s voice from above him, and Niccolò started when the thief’s hand stroked his hair. He looked up at Volpe, a little breathless, and scowled when the older man pinched his chin. “Both of you,” Volpe clarified, and released him, settled instead on the side of the bed. Tessa reached for him, expression plaintive, and he caressed the side of her face. “Is this what you wanted, _caro_?”

Tessa nodded, almost frantically, and Volpe bent to kiss her. Machiavelli watched with abject fascination, transfixed by the fleeting sight of Volpe’s tongue plundering the girl’s mouth. Volpe reached for him, and Machiavelli jumped a little when the thief’s hand caught his. Volpe guided Machiavelli’s hand between Tessa’s legs, and Niccolò exhaled slowly when he felt the dampness of her breeches.

He rather lost track of the next few hours. He spent what seemed a long time with his mouth between Tessa’s legs, far longer than was necessary to prepare her, but he had missed the taste of a woman’s need and she was so lovely and pliant beneath him, her hands pulling on his hair, her sweet voice whimpering out his name. Volpe touched what Machiavelli could not, kissing the girl deeply, caressing her throat and breasts and sides, and when Machiavelli finally pulled himself free of his trousers and thrust into her, she was gloriously wet and warm, her muscles fluttering around his cock. Volpe reached between her legs, stroked the tight little jewel of her clit until she shook and sobbed through her climax, taking Niccolò with her just as he was getting comfortable.

And then Volpe had her, though Machiavelli didn’t remember precisely how, because around that time he put back a glass of brandy before he rejoined them on the bed. At some point Tessa put her mouth on him, brought him back to hardness just with her teasing tongue, and he took her from behind, longer and harder, burying his mouth against her slender shoulder while she moaned for him.

And it was then that Volpe had touched him—so light Machiavelli might have imagined it, just a warm hand that settled on the nape of his neck and squeezed gently, but Niccolò knew that had been what put him over the edge.

It was near dawn when they finally slept, sated and aching, and though he was sure at the time that Volpe had followed them under the coverlet, Machiavelli awoke some hours to find Tessa alone in the bed with him. She was sound asleep against his chest, her legs tangled with his. Volpe was nowhere to be seen; he’d left no clothes behind, and his boots were missing from the entryway. Machiavelli sat up with difficulty and soothed Tessa back into the bed, nestling her beneath the coverlet, before getting out of bed and heading to the washroom.

He surveyed himself in the mirror, smiled a little to find that Tessa had scratched long red lines all down his back and sides in the throes of their lovemaking. He looked like he felt—well-rested and well-fucked, for the first time in ages. He cleaned his groin and face with the cold water in the basin and pulled on his clothes as he stepped back into the bedroom.

Tessa was awake, albeit just, squinting at him from beneath the blankets. “Aw,” she murmured, watching him lace up his breeches, “no morning delights?”

“I’m sorry. I’m needed elsewhere.” He took her face in his hands and turned it upward for a kiss, let his lips wander over her nose and to her brow. She giggled. “Thank you. I enjoyed myself immensely.”

“Perhaps we could do it again.” She trailed her fingertips down his chest. “Perhaps even just the two of us.”

He smiled, gently took her hands from his skin. “I’ll speak to your master.”

Her expression turned thunderous. “Volpe doesn’t get to decide who I sleep with.”

“No, _caro_ , that’s not what I meant. I only mean that he trusts me, and I would be honest with him.”

“Oh.” Her face relaxed, and she smiled, maybe a little apologetically. “He told me you two are good friends.”

That surprised him, for reasons he couldn’t quite identify, but he nodded. “We are.”

She grinned, and her fingertips caressed his member, now soft and tucked safely in his breeches. “You must be great friends if you share your lovers.”

“This was the first time,” Niccolò admitted, and pushed her hand away. “Girl, I really am needed at the Signoria.”

She sighed with no small amount of drama and rolled over in bed, tucking her arms beneath the pillow. “Fine, fine. Then I shall languish here, in this cold bed, and hope my gallant lover _deigns_ to return someday, should la Volpe give him permission.”

Machiavelli grinned and leaned over her, bit several suckling kisses into her shoulder until she giggled and swatted at him, and finally took his leave.

* * *

He did, as it so happened, see Tessa again, twice without Volpe, but then they invited him again to their bed—not for any particular reason except that Niccolò wanted him there, though he couldn’t say why. She was the sort of girl a man could fall in love with, if he wasn’t careful with his heart. But Machiavelli was, and when she told them she was no longer interested in their liaisons, the farewell and well wishes he bid her were heartfelt. He counted her a friend, and was glad of it.

He sought a few lovers on his own then, finding his confidence renewed. He spent a few nights with the wife of a fellow Signoria member, who was many years her husband’s junior and utterly bored of their marital bed. Machiavelli was nonplussed when her attention turned toward a bravo even younger than he, who had all the strutting arrogance and a masculine swagger that Niccolò himself had always lacked.

He actually found his own way to another man then, a city guard whose post at the Signoria’s door brought them into one another’s path again and again. Vincenzo was just two years Niccolò’s senior, his height but more sturdily built, with exquisitely dark hair that felt silken beneath Machiavelli’s hands. Their affair was like a wildfire, burning quick but intensely hot. Niccolò doubled and then some his experience taking other men in the two months they were together. And then Vincenzo, too, left—his father had arranged his marriage to a Colonna girl, an absurdly lucrative and lucky match, and he skipped off to the Romagna. He didn’t say goodbye so much as mention off-handedly that he would be leaving, and while Machiavelli wasn’t terribly heartbroken to see him go, it did mean he was without a consistent bedmate again.

He and la Volpe, however, did not falter in their evenings together, now thrice weekly, alternating between Machiavelli’s office and the hideout. If Volpe had pursued other lovers since Tessa, he didn’t speak of them, though Machiavelli did ask, but he forced himself to be content with the thief’s winsome smile as his only answer.

* * *

Some four months after their mutual affair with Tessa reached its amicable end, la Volpe came to him with another proposition. Two young women, Niccolò’s age, who had taken a liking to Volpe over a game of hazard at a local inn and invited him to bed.

“When I told them I had a friend around their age who nearly matches my vigor in bed, they were very excited,” Volpe told him, smiling around a glass of wine. Machiavelli sighed heavily, as if long-suffering. But he did say yes. And he got an absolutely frenetic night of absurdly athletic sex out of it, a night he’d never forget, so who was he to complain?

After that, it seemed, their partnership was back on. They were, Machiavelli supposed, good complements to one another in the bedroom—he preferred sex that was sensual, gentle, and Volpe could always be relied upon for a rough carnal fuck to wrap up the night. Girls seemed to like them as a pair, laughed at their biting repartee, and certainly their lovers benefitted from their one-upmanship.

One girl, Francesca, laughingly asked them if they ever made love to one another during their little adventures. Volpe and Machiavelli looked at one another, and it was Volpe who grinned and said:

“No, as of yet. Perhaps we should.”

And though Machiavelli would deny it to himself later, when he came inside Francesca that night, he was thinking about those words.

* * *

Nothing of the sort actually happened, though, until Fioretta.

Machiavelli actually met her the way most men of his age met women—their fathers were trying to haggle out a match. Her family would not provide the great dowry Bernardo Machiavelli had been dreaming of, but their families were friends—well, not enemies, at least. Her family were known to be dissidents, agitators against the Medici, and that had quelled any chance of a match when they were younger. But Piero de Medici had fled from his mistakes with the French invasion in 1494 and taken most of his house with him. All of Florence was anti-Medici these days, and so while their fathers argued about bridal prices and combined family assets, Niccolò and Fioretta took to taking walks up and down the Arno—always accompanied by his sister or hers, or both. She was a virgin, and her father guarded her innocence like a hawk.

Machiavelli actually liked her. She was exceedingly sweet, very much a girl of twenty, and very curious about the world. She loved poetry, had taught herself to read and write in secret from her father and brothers just so she could read Petrarch by candlelight when the rest of her house had gone to bed.

Their match fell through—probably his own father’s fault, though Niccolò didn’t ask for details—but the walks along the river didn’t stop. Now, however, they were unaccompanied, because Fioretta left her house to meet Niccolò in secret. She was curious, he realized, about more than distant lands and exotic spices—she was tired of her father’s tight control. And while Machiavelli didn’t think she loved him, she certainly wanted him.

But they could be tricky, virgins, and Niccolò didn’t quite trust himself to do right by her. He did, however, trust Volpe, who had years and years more experience and a way of setting people at ease. When Machiavelli introduced them, there was no mistaking the look of fascination on Fioretta’s face, nor the desire in her eyes—Niccolò knew it from the way her lips parted and her pupils dilated. Smiling, he leaned in to whisper in her ear, and asked her.

He had been right to think that an affair between both of them and a virgin would be complicated, but he had also underestimated its delights. Once Fioretta was comfortable, convinced that the sex act wouldn’t hurt, that they would take care of her, she gave herself over to them beautifully. They spent several nights together abed without actually fucking, teaching her the things she didn’t know. Someone had to, Niccolò realized, else she may someday find herself trapped in a marriage with a man who didn’t know how to treat her, and she may think that was the way love was meant to be.

When Niccolò finally did take her, lying on his back so she could sink down on his cock at a pace she found comfortable, it really was incredible—ecstatic, almost, to watch the petal-pink flesh of her intimacy part around his length, to watch her know a man for the first time. She rode him with eyes closed and mouth open, her slender hips rocking.

Machiavelli rolled his head against the pillow, looked over at la Volpe, seated nearby, and found the thief watching them—no, watching _him,_ gazing at him with an expression of unreadable intensity. That look had pushed Niccolò so close to orgasm that he’d almost flailed to stop Fioretta, to keep himself from finishing in her too early, before she’d had the time to explore the new pleasures he offered.

A month afterward, she was comfortable with them, and a regular fixture in their lives. Twice a week Volpe and Machiavelli drank and talked and played games together, and for their third meeting they joined Fioretta in one or the other’s bed. She seemed content, a while, to let them share her, but finally, one night, she asked—

“Will you two…” She made a vague back-and-forth motion with her hand, indicating the space between them. “You know. For me?”

Volpe, curled at the head of the bed with her dainty feet in his lap, grinned at her. “You would see us together?”

Fioretta blushed and nodded. Across from Volpe, Niccolò sat with his back to the wall, Fioretta’s head in his lap while he trailed lazy caresses through her hair. He tried not to let his trepidation show when Volpe looked at him.

“I’m not opposed,” he said, and Volpe’s grin widened—he was no doubt amused by Niccolò’s careful, diplomatic response. “It’s simply never transpired.”

“Niccolò Machiavelli isn’t _opposed_ to lying with me?” the thief said, mock-gasping, and placed a hand over his chest. He winked at Fioretta. “Be still, my heart.”

She giggled, and Machiavelli scowled at him. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“I’m only teasing, _amico_ ,” Volpe soothed, his voice silken. “I am amenable to giving the lady what she wants.”

“As am I.”

“Well, then.” Volpe extended a hand, his smile broad and flashing. Machiavelli helped Fioretta sit up, and she scrambled to the side, watching them with wide, eager eyes. Machiavelli appraised Volpe’s hand before taking it, and the thief drew him close.

La Volpe didn’t kiss him—not at first. First he dropped Niccolò to the bed like he was one of their girls, teased him with a hand in his hair, with fingers along his neck. His eyes were dark, searching. Niccolò knew the beast coiling tight in his lower belly, could have named it desire, but didn’t—named it something else instead, a purely physical reaction to the softness of Volpe’s touch on his skin.

Long fingers lingered on his jaw, turned his face up. The caresses of Volpe’s thumb along his cheek were slow, soft. The expression on the thief’s face was unreadable. Machiavelli wanted to touch him and was too terrified to do so. He lifted his hands, briefly, and then lowered them again to grip the coverlet instead. He wished he were naked—somehow that would be better, to be naked and lewd and writhing, than to be subjected to this slow, searching intimacy.

Volpe braced himself over the assassin, hesitated. It wasn’t like him to hesitate. When he realized the thief wasn’t going to close the distance, Niccolò pushed himself up onto his elbows and leaned in close. The first kiss he ever claimed from the thief was a stolen one, a short, fleeting press of lips that nonetheless made his heart begin to gallop and his hair stand on end. Volpe’s eyes were open and watching him when Machiavelli drew back.

Volpe’s eyes softened. They really were astoundingly beautiful, Machiavelli thought—and then Volpe leaned over him, pressed him back into the bed, and kissed him so soundly that it stole his breath away. It was not the sort of kiss that was a preamble for sex, nor the playful little things that Volpe liked stealing from his lover’s mouths when he caught them unawares. It was another thing entirely.

Fioretta made a soft sound, an “ _Oh_ ,” and Machiavelli heard the slick sound of her fingers between her legs. Suddenly, powerfully, he couldn’t stand that she was there, that she was watching. That his first kiss with la Volpe had been _watched_ felt like such an invasion, such an _affront_ , that he felt himself begin to shake.

He couldn’t be here—that was the only thought in his head. He planted both hands on Volpe’s chest and shoved, pushing the thief off of him and scrambling from the bed.

“I have to go,” he said, before Volpe could question him. “I forgot—I have to—I just have to go.”

“Machia,” Volpe said, a little weakly, and Machiavelli couldn’t bear to turn and see the look on his face—his hurt, his confusion. “Niccolò, wait.”

Machiavelli shook his head. He gathered his coat from the floor, tried and failed to find his belt, elected in that moment to abandon it, no matter that it was Venetian leather and had cost a fortune. He swung his coat around his shoulders and hurried to step into his boots.

“Niccolò, _wait_ ,” Volpe said again, and this time a hand caught Machiavelli’s arm and forced him to turn around. He was right—Volpe did look hurt, and he did look confused, but there was something else in his face, a tired, resigned knowingness that felt like an axe in Machiavelli’s ribs. He jerked his arm from the thief’s grasp, shaking his head, and hurried out the door.

Two nights later, when Volpe was scheduled to arrive in Niccolò’s office for their customary wine and chess, he didn’t come. Machiavelli spent an agonizing evening watching the door, stiffening every time he heard footsteps in the hall or a dove fluttered by the window, until he could take it no longer and retired early, leaving a mountain of unfinished work in his wake.

Fioretta didn’t try to come and see him, nor did he try to see her. Whatever was between them was done, at least as far as he was concerned. He had cared for the girl, but now merely thinking of her made resentment pool in his stomach. He felt, inexplicably, that she had somehow stolen something from him, something he couldn’t ever get back. It was a foul feeling, to suddenly detest the girl who had so trusted him, with whom he had spent many a happy, tender hour. But he couldn’t help it. When his father told him two weeks later that Fioretta’s match had been made with a distant Sforza cousin, Niccolò couldn’t think of anything he cared about less.

He didn’t see Volpe at all in those interceding two weeks. On the third week, the thief didn’t reappear, but Machiavelli did enter his office one morning to find a bottle of a rare vintage on his desk, along with a note signed with a very poor sketch of a fox peeking out of its hole. Machiavelli turned the note in his hands, found himself smiling, his heart aching with a fondness he couldn’t recall feeling up till now. When Biagio and Agostino, his assistants, had gone home, yawning loudly and grumbling about the volume of work they were behind on, Machiavelli closed the office behind them and opened its windows.

Volpe saw the invitation for what it was and alighted on the landing outside the window a moment later. He crept into the office, silent as a shadow, and might have surprised Machiavelli had the assassin not been waiting for him. He had opened the wine bottle and poured their glasses already, was nursing his with his feet propped on his desk when Volpe entered.

Machiavelli gestured to the thief’s customary place, the chair across his desk. La Volpe eyed him for a moment, then sat. Neither spoke for a time; Machiavelli supposed the silence was a little awkward.

“We should speak,” Volpe said at last, “about what happened a few weeks ago.”

Machiavelli nodded, but didn’t offer any comment. The thief frowned. When he inhaled, his breath shuddered.

“If I hurt you or upset you in some way, I need to know. I need to know so that I can be sure it never happens again.”

Machiavelli started. “What? Hurt…? No. Oh, no, Volpe, no, _amico_. That’s not it.” He set his wine glass aside and reached across the desk, gripped Volpe’s arm. “You didn’t hurt me. You have never hurt me. Banish the thought.”

After a moment, Volpe relaxed. He cautiously covered Machiavelli’s hand with his. “It’s been keeping me up at night. I couldn’t stop replaying that moment in my head, wondering what I had done to…”

“Nothing. I swear, you did nothing. It wasn’t my intention to make you think otherwise.” Machiavelli couldn’t help himself; he lifted his hand from the thief’s arm and cradled Volpe’s cheek. “I’m sorry, Gilberto. For making you wonder.”

Volpe nodded, slowly, his expression still somehow perplexed. Niccolò dropped his hand and sat back in his desk, clearing his throat.

“And I must apologize further, for how I left that night.”

“Something upset you.”

“Well, yes.” Machiavelli fiddled with the clasps of his coat. Volpe’s gaze had a way of making him feel miserably exposed. Vulnerable. “It was…irrational. Not like me.”

Volpe hummed, his head tilting to the side, ever just. His gaze softened. “Fioretta was heartbroken.”

Machiavelli finally felt a pang of regret, and nodded. “I’ll write to her and apologize. I didn’t mean for her to be hurt.”

“I know you didn’t.” Volpe was quiet for a moment. He took up his glass of wine and sipped it delicately. “You like? A fifty-year vintage, from the kingdom of Catalan.” Machiavelli didn’t respond, his gaze fixed on his lap, and Volpe sighed. “Alright. Enough speaking around the subject, as we are wont to do. Tell me what irrational thing upset you so.”

Machiavelli inhaled, then swallowed. “It was…” He stopped, tried to gather himself, but his thoughts were racing, his heart thundering behind his ribs. He wanted to press a hand to his chest to feel it pulsing so wildly. “It was…not the way I had imagined kissing you for the first time.”

Volpe’s eyes widened, but he didn’t speak—just looked, with that expression of intimate and intense surveying, as if he were trying to see Niccolò’s thoughts. Machiavelli shifted in his seat.

“I told you,” he said, a little bitterly. “It’s irrational. Foolish. I shouldn’t have—”

“How much have you had to drink?” Volpe interrupted him.

“What?”

“Wine. How much tonight?”

“Just… not even this half-glass.”

“Then you can still climb, yes?”

“Yes,” Niccolò said, bewildered. “What is this about?”

Volpe nodded, more to himself than to Machiavelli, and got to his feet. “Good. Then come with me.” And he strode across the room and climbed out the window without further preamble.

Utterly dumbfounded, Machiavelli stared after him—and then he followed.

Much of his training as an assassin had involved, as it had for Ezio, scrambling across Florence’s rooftops, memorizing the peculiar dips and turns of the city as well as learning where the guards tended to patrol, where to hide in case he was caught scampering across the city’s canopy like an illicit monkey. But his training was a few years behind him now, and Niccolò found himself struggling to keep up with the thief, who moved across the rooftops like a shadow, whose momentum and stride was so perfectly calculated that he did not so much climb as float up and down the inclines and walls that left Niccolò puffing and gasping in his wake.

They were five minutes from the Palazzo della Signoria when Volpe dropped to the piazza below. Niccolò followed, hitting the ground with a thud that made his teeth rattle, and ran to catch up with the thief’s brisk stride.

“No,” he groaned, when he realized they were approaching the great bell tower that flanked the Cathedral of Santa Maria, with its great dome lifting the night sky. “Please.”

Volpe turned back to look at him, his grin wide. “Come on. You’re an assassin, are you not?” And he turned, closed the distance between them and the tower at a fast jog, and cleared an impressive leap that gave him a handhold. He began to climb, spider-like, leaving Machiavelli gaping after him.

The tower was tall, tall enough that Niccolò had to crane his head to see its full ascent, and Volpe was scrambling up its side with apparent ease. Giotto’s tower was no small feat—Ezio had nearly killed himself once trying to scale the thing in pursuit of some treasure he thought might be at the top. Machiavelli took a moment to ready himself, steadying his breathing, and then he did as Volpe had done and took the thing at a run.

It was, as he had predicted, hard going, and the higher he climbed, the more aware he became of the price he’d pay if he missed a handhold or let loose the tension in his legs. He didn’t dare look up to see how far ahead of him Volpe had gotten; he kept his attention on reaching for the next metal bracket, the next open slat in the window, to haul himself upwards. The wind whipped around him, tossing his hair and coat. He wished he were in his assassin’s whites, which were better made for the rigorous activity than his everyday wear, but like hell was he about to climb back down and miss… whatever it was that Volpe intended to happen.

After what seemed an interminably long time, his fingertips grasped the ledge at the top. Strong hands gripped his forearm, and Volpe hauled him up. Infuriatingly, the thief didn’t even seem winded—if the climb had tired him, he’d been far enough ahead that waiting for Machiavelli to catch up had given him ample time to recover. Machiavelli collapsed on his back against the bell tower’s roof and focused on sucking air into his lungs, ignoring Volpe snickering at him.

When the urge to vomit passed, he got back to his feet. Volpe stood at the edge, turning his body in a slow circle to take in the sweeping cityscape. When he noticed Machiavelli was upright, he turned to him with a smile.

“Your Florence,” he said, indicating the view with a wide sweep of his arm, and turned back to admire it.

“Beautiful,” Machiavelli murmured, but for once, he wasn’t looking at his city—he was looking at this thief, trying to make sense of the painful tangle of emotions knotted in his heart. “Will you explain now why you put me through that?”

Volpe turned to him and pushed his hood down. Outside of their evening talks and their time in the bedroom, Niccolò had never seen Volpe uncowled, and he stared without the slightest hint of embarrassment, transfixed by the sight, by the way Volpe’s hair whipped and curled in the wind.

Volpe’s smile was gentle. He was looking at Machiavelli the way he always did, but Machiavelli had not realized until precisely that moment that it was a look that Volpe reserved only for him.

“I thought that this vista might make a better backdrop for a first kiss,” Volpe said. “Perhaps as you had imagined it.”

Machiavelli stared at him for a long, frozen moment. There was no version of reality, no version of him in any world real or unnatural, where he denied la Volpe at this juncture—he was merely memorizing it, all of it, how the wind teased Volpe’s hair, how his eyes and clothes bronzed in the last light of dusk. How the city looked spread beneath them, almost otherworldly in its beauty.

Wordlessly, Niccolò extended a hand, and Volpe took it, let the assassin draw him close. They kissed, and it was as Niccolò had always imagined it—his hands on Volpe’s face, in his hair, Volpe’s hands on his waist, holding him, kissing one another high enough that only God could have seen, assuming He was even looking.

It hurt to part, even just long enough for Volpe to cradle the back of his neck and whisper an invitation in his ear—“Just the two of us this time.” Niccolò nodded, and they kissed again, hungry, desperate, nearly two years of pent-up yearning suddenly finding an outlet, like a previously dammed river finally punching the tiniest hole in its muddy prison. Volpe stepped back from him, toward the wooden ledge that marked the hay bale far below, and Machiavelli reached for him.

“You’re kidding—from this height? We’ll die.”

“Perhaps.” Volpe canted his head, smiled. He drew up his head. “But that’s why they call it a leap of faith, _amore_.” And he jumped.

Machiavelli scrambled to the edge, held his breath as Volpe’s form plummeted through the air, an impossibly long fall—and saw him land, disappear into a sheaf of hay for several agonizing seconds, and then tumble back out of the cart only a little shakier than he’d been before.

Niccolò breathed a sigh, smiled to see Volpe craning his head back, squinting up at him against the setting sun. He got to his feet and approached the ledge. He cast a last look around at Florence, which he never got to admire from such heights, felt a fleeting and inexplicable moment of certainty that his city would look just the same long after he and Volpe were dead and gone, their names forgotten. That, he decided, gazing at the Palazzo della Signoria, silhouetted against the sunset, was the only thing he would leave to fortune. The rest he would see to himself.

Far down below, Gilberto was calling after him, his voice nearly whisked away on the wind. Machiavelli backed up a few steps, then took his leap of faith at a run.


	2. Chapter 2

“Give me an hour,” Volpe had said, and crowded Machiavelli against the door of his office and kissed him—not the strange, searching first kiss from a few weeks prior, and not the sweet thing from the top of the bell tower, but a hungry thing heavy with promise.

The note he’d pressed into Machiavelli’s hand contained directions. Machiavelli assumed they’d traipse together back to the thief’s hideout, but the directions indicated a residence on the opposite side of the river. He could only fathom what sexual contrivances might take an hour to set up—but an hour was also just enough time to go home and bathe, which he felt he needed to do desperately, sweat-soaked as he was from their hard climb.

It was only just past sunset when he arrived home, and his brother Totto was still up, reading in the parlor with his feet up on the chair opposite his. Niccolò slapped his feet down and ruffled his little brother’s curls before heading for the stairs.

“Welcome back,” Totto grunted, and put his feet back up.

“I’m heading back out in a bit—is there water for the bath?”

“It’s probably freezing. What are you off to do at this hour?”

“I’ve not the slightest fucking clue,” Niccolò muttered.

He bathed as quickly as possible—Totto was correct in assessing the water’s temperature, and Niccolò trembled as he stepped out and dried off, shivering and dancing a little on the washroom’s tile floor. He’d forgotten a change of clothes, and his sister Margherita chastised him for running through the hall in only a towel. Once in his room, though, the question of clothes suddenly perplexed for him—he reached for three different shirts and disliked each for different reasons. Finally he wrestled on a pair of hose over his damp legs and jogged back across the hall to stick his head into Margherita’s room.

“Rita?”

“What?” She lowered her book, then squealed and hid her face behind it again. “For Christ’s sake, would you put some clothes on?!”

“I’m decent enough. Don’t be a baby.”

“What do you want?”

“What would you wear if you wanted to please a man?”

Margherita peeked around her book and scowled at him. “Well, firstly, I’d die before I wore something specifically to please a man, so make a note.”

He rolled his eyes. “For the sake of the hypothetical, could you just pretend to be normal? Just for a minute?”

“Ass.” She put down her book and sat up on her bed, crossing her legs. “Why do you want to know?”

“I told you. It’s hypothetical.”

She grinned and waggled an eyebrow at him. “Do you hypothetically have a liaison planned?”

“If I did, what should I wear?”

Margherita considered for a moment, tapping a fingertip to her chin. “Well—is it coming off later?”

Niccolò sighed and made to withdraw. “You’re useless.”

“Wait, wait,” she said, laughing, and hopped off the bed to grab his sleeve. “I’m only teasing. Show me what you have.”

He tried to resist, but it was useless—once Margherita decided upon a course of action, there was no hope of changing her mind. Back in his room, she tore open his armoire, picking out items of clothing and then tossing them aside with a click of her tongue.

“You don’t actually have to make a mess,” Niccolò grumbled, trying to scramble around the room in her wake and pick up her rejects. He turned, and a leather vest slapped against his face. “Margherita!”

“You’re the one who asked for help.” She pulled out one of his favorite doublets, considered it for a moment, then tossed it aside. “Haven’t you got something that isn’t black?”

“What’s wrong with black?”

“It’s _boring_.”

“It’s dignified,” he protested, and she gave him a withering look.

“Yes, nothing says ‘strip me naked and toss me into your bed’ like a nice _, dignified_ black doublet,” she snorted. Her mouth dropped open, and she withdrew from his armoire with an ostentatious gold-and-silver number with a ruffled collar. She turned to him, a slow grin spreading across her face.

“That was a gift,” he mumbled, his cheeks heating.

“Uh huh.”

“It was!”

“I believe you,” she said, her voice trembling from the effort of not laughing, but she returned it to the armoire. “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you worry for more than a moment about what you wear.” She flashed him a grin. “He must be handsome.”

“Get out of my room.”

“Christ, but you’re prickly.” She paused, and actually beamed as she withdrew a doublet stuffed at the back of the armoire. She didn’t look at it for more than a moment before tossing it to him. “This one.”

He frowned, holding it up. It wasn’t particularly striking—dark blue, laces instead of buttons, cutaway sleeves. He couldn’t even remember when he’d acquired it. “Why?”

“Trust me.” She tossed her hair over her shoulder. “Put on a white shirt underneath, and black trousers.”

“Not hose?”

Margherita’s grin was so sharp, she almost seemed possessed of fangs. “Leave a little something to the imagination.”

He supposed it wasn’t worth mentioning that Volpe had already seen him naked on scores of occasions. “If you say so. Thank you.”

“My pleasure.” She all but skipped to the door, and headed into the hallway—then stuck her head back in. “Did you wash your ass?”

He chucked a vest at her, and she withdrew, cackling.

Niccolò was halfway to the address Volpe had indicated (on a truly poorly drawn map) when he realized he felt nervous. He stopped for a moment to suck in a lungful of cool night air, then another, leaning against the nearest building and pressing a hand to his chest to feel his racing heart. It was only Volpe, he reminded himself. His friend and comrade of over two years, whose bed he had already shared countless times before, who had already seen him at his most vulnerable and intimate. Just because they hadn’t had sex with each _other_ didn’t mean that tonight would be any more novel than any night prior. Volpe had seen everything before.

He sighed. Why was he trying to fool himself?—It was different. _This_ was different. He had felt it in the way la Volpe kissed him. If it was just fucking, it could have happened at any point prior. Volpe had been waiting for…for something to shift, to change.

But it was also possible, Niccolò realized, with a sense of dawning horror, that Volpe didn’t really desire him at all—perhaps he was only going along with this to preserve their friendship. Or worse, Machiavelli’s dignity. Christ, perhaps the thief was about to turn him down—gently, politely, he was sure, but even the thought made Niccolò’s chest constrict. Maybe the thief would fuck him once, get it over with, and discard him even before the cool light of the morning.

It wasn’t entirely outside the realm of possibility. They’d had a few lovers toward whom Volpe had only felt lukewarm, and he had only agreed to keep seeing them because Machiavelli was still interested—or to spare their feelings. God. If la Volpe bedded him out of pity, Niccolò didn’t think he would survive it. He just wouldn’t.

Somehow, he had reached the address Volpe gave him. He didn’t remember continuing his walk toward what increasingly felt like his doom. He stood before a humble little house; very faint candlelight illuminated the windows. (Perhaps Volpe wasn’t there at all—perhaps he was hiding on the rooftops overhead, laughing himself silly at this fool boy standing at his door hoping—)

No. Niccolò gave his head a shake. La Volpe was his friend—he believed that. He remembered the way Volpe had touched him that first time with Tessa, how tender the hand that had cradled the back of his neck. Volpe cared for him, maybe even wanted him—and if there was the remotest chance of the latter, Machiavelli had to know.

He knocked. Mercifully, Volpe didn’t keep him waiting—a moment later, the door swung open. Several seconds passed before Niccolò realized that the man standing across the threshold really was la Volpe—he was dressed in a simple linen shirt and dark hose, and he was almost unrecognizable without his orange cape and ostentatious dress. Unhooded, his hair fell in a tumble nearly to his shoulders. Niccolò’s fingers twitched, remembering the texture.

Volpe seemed taken aback as well, for a long moment passed before he smiled and leant his head against the door frame. “Well. Aren’t you a vision.”

Niccolò’s cheeks flushed. “Don’t tease me.”

“I would never,” Volpe said, mock-offended, and extended a hand. “Won’t you come in?”

Niccolò hesitated, then accepted the proffered hand. Volpe tugged him inside and pushed a hand against the door. It was still slightly ajar when Volpe pulled him close and kissed him, and Niccolò lost his breath. Volpe pressed him against the door, and it clicked closed behind his back.

He’d been a fool, he realized, belatedly, to worry for even a moment that this man didn’t want him. Volpe’s mouth was warm and insistent on his, his hands caressing around Niccolò’s hips. When Volpe drew back, Niccolò was humiliated to find himself briefly chasing the thief’s mouth before leaning away, his face hot, his lips and teeth buzzing like Volpe had transmitted some current between them.

Volpe grinned, a smug thing, self-satisfied, and Niccolò scowled at him. “I apologize. I meant to wait a little before doing that again, but I couldn’t help myself. You looked so tempting.”

“I’m not a pastry,” Niccolò grumbled, averting his eyes from the thief’s gaze.

“Oh, no?” Volpe chuckled, and leaned in close again, his mouth caressing Niccolò’s neck, and the assassin shuddered. “And here I had every intention of devouring you.”

“Ass” was all Machiavelli could think to mutter, still unable to meet his—friend’s? lover’s?—eyes, and Volpe laughed and released him. It was a mercy—any longer, and the arousal flooding Niccolò’s veins would make itself apparent elsewhere.

It was only after the thief drew away that Machiavelli had a moment to take in his new surroundings. He found himself in a small house as humble within as without, which surprised him; he rather expected any abode of Volpe’s to be overflowing with jewels, expensive trinkets, even piles of gold. In his head, la Volpe was not so much a fox as a dragon brooding over its hoard.

It really did just look like a normal house—tiny space around the fireplace for cooking, a rough-hewn wooden table laden with food and wine, a bookshelf sparsely populated by a few slim volumes, a bed heaped with blankets and cushions. Even the armoire was tiny. Machiavelli stepped in a little cautiously, his head swiveling. Volpe watched him with a look of faint amusement.

“What are you looking for?”

“Traps,” Machiavelli muttered, and the thief laughed.

“You’ll find no traps here, _amico_ ,” Volpe said, his voice warm. He was looking at Machiavelli with that unbearably soft expression, the one that made Niccolò’s chest constrict to the point of pain. He busied himself with examining the books on the shelf. “It’s a safe house. Just a place to lie low in the event one is caught by the city guards, or should the hideout be compromised somehow.”

Machiavelli hummed, picked up one of the books and thumbed through it. He didn’t register even the title, much less even the words within—his heart was beating too fast, so fast his vision blurred. “You could always come hide with me.”

“The Signoria is hardly safe respite for thieves.”

“No, I meant my house. In Santo Spirito?” He turned to look at Volpe, shrugged. “Or there’s always the farm, in Percussina. Just come to me if you have need of a place to hide. I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”

Volpe stared at him, his expression curiously stricken—and then he crossed the room in several long seconds and pressed himself against Machiavelli’s back, encircled the assassin’s waist in his arms. Niccolò froze, at a loss for how to respond, and then Volpe spoke in a murmur against his nape.

“You’re kind to me. You always have been—more than I’ve ever deserved.”

Niccolò hesitated, then placed his hand over Volpe’s where it rested against his stomach. “You…deserve kindness,” he said cautiously, almost afraid that words too gentle would scare the thief away. “As much as anyone else.”

Volpe chuckled. His arms tightened, so slightly that it was as if he were trying to keep Machiavelli from noticing. “Thank you for saying so.” He turned Niccolò around, backed him into the wall. Machiavelli snorted, resting his hands on the thief’s chest.

“How many more times tonight will you pin me to a wall?”

“Where else ought I pin art?” the thief purred, and Niccolò groaned.

Volpe kissed him then, deeply, and Niccolò leaned into it with a shamelessly eager sound that got lost between their mouths. He slid his hands into Volpe’s hair, tugged gently. The texture was glorious, the scent that wafted from those dark locks delicious—warm and spicy, like cinnamon. He had always wanted to caress these curls, had always held himself back—and now he could touch all he liked. The thought sent a little thrill down his spine.

“There’s a sweetness in you that you reserve only for your lovers,” Volpe murmured, parting just long enough to stroke Niccolò’s mouth with his thumb before leaning in for another kiss.

“Are you—mm—are you my lover?”

Volpe laughed against his mouth. “I have always been your lover, you sweet fool. You simply didn’t know it.”

Machiavelli tugged on his hair to get some space between them, frowning up into the thief’s smiling, irritatingly handsome face. “How long?”

“More or less since the moment we first spoke.”

“Then why in God’s name did you wait?”

Volpe’s smile faded, and his brows knit. “You were young—you’re young still,” he said, a touch bitterly, and Machiavelli was stunned to hear his voice waver a little. “Too young for all that has been thrust upon you. The creed, the Borgia courts, the Signoria… all of it. I had no desire to add to your burdens.” His knuckles brushed Machiavelli’s cheek, perhaps the tenderest touch he’d laid upon the assassin so far—perhaps the tenderest touch Machiavelli had ever felt, period. “I only wanted what was best for you.”

Machiavelli’s frown deepened. “What’s best for me isn’t for you to decide.”

“No,” Volpe acquiesced, “and I pray you’ll forgive my thinking otherwise. You were a boy.” His smile returned, sharp and mischievous. “But you’re a boy no longer. And besides—it will be all the sweeter because we waited so long.”

Machiavelli huffed. “You chose an atrocious time to develop an appreciation for delayed gratification.”

“Indeed. It’s very much unlike me. But then, most of the things you make me feel and do make me seem a stranger, even to myself.”

Swallowing, Machiavelli traced a fingertip along Volpe’s collarbone, which was exposed by the low cut of the shirt he wore. “I affect you so?”

“Fishing for compliments?”

“I’m used to your chiding and mocking,” Niccolò shot back. “And now you flatter me? What am I to make of it?”

“Niccolò,” Volpe said, his voice exasperated and somehow fond all at once, “it’s called seduction.”

Machiavelli opened his mouth, then closed it again. “Oh,” he mumbled.

Volpe grinned. “May I kiss you again?”

Niccolò nodded, embarrassed, suddenly shy, and he actually whimpered when Volpe leaned close and kissed him— _whimpered_ , but he couldn’t help himself, because Volpe’s mouth was the sweetest thing he’d ever known. And there was such heat in it now, in the way Volpe’s tongue swept into his mouth and drew a soft moan from him before he could stop it. Volpe’s hand wrapped around the back of his neck and squeezed, and Niccolò tipped his head back, released a trembling gasp when Volpe’s teeth traced his pulse. It was humiliating, the sounds Volpe could get out of him—he was behaving like a virgin quivering before her marital bed, all of his confidence and composure slipping away out of his grasp. But he had also never _wanted_ anyone like this, never felt so desperate for another’s touch.

“Bed,” he breathed, shivering under the open-mouthed kisses Volpe was busy trailing along his neck.

“I meant to take my time a little,” Volpe said, laughing, a little breathless. “I was looking forward to trying to win you over—I even made you dinner.”

“After, please, just… please.” Machiavelli tugged on him, curled a hand into the back of Volpe’s hair. “You’ve made me wait long enough.”

Volpe’s eyes softened, and he swallowed the pleading sound Niccolò made against his mouth when they kissed. “Sweet boy,” he murmured, and lifted the assassin with an ease that made Niccolò’s stomach leap. He didn’t even have the presence of mind to be irritated—he only wrapped his legs around Volpe’s waist and bent to keep kissing him while Volpe ferried him toward the bed at the back of the house.

It really was terribly, tooth-rottingly romantic right up until Volpe dumped him on the bed like a sack of potatoes, and Machiavelli yelped in a mixture of surprise and affront while the thief snickered down at him.

“Can you not let a minute pass without behaving like a barbarian?”

“Ah, yes, tossing my lover into my bed—positively _barbaric_ of me,” Volpe drawled, and made to pull off his shirt, but Niccolò seized his wrist.

“Wait—let me.”

Volpe blinked, then lowered his arms, smiling. “You want to undress me?”

“I haven’t before.” Niccolò released the thief’s wrist and trailed his fingertips along Volpe’s stomach. More often than not, he never saw the thief undress at all—Machiavelli usually got their partner comfortable, and at some point Volpe would leap into the bed, suddenly bare as the day he was born.

Volpe hummed, caught his hand, and brought the inside of Machiavelli’s wrist to his mouth. The thief climbed onto the bed and seated himself in a straddle on Niccolò’s thighs, as casually as if it were the thousandth time, not the first. The look in his eyes was so heated that Niccolò struggled not to look away. “Undress me, then.”

Machiavelli swallowed and sat up, raised his hands cautiously to Volpe’s hips, slid his palms along the margin where the thief’s shirt was tucked into his trousers. The hands Volpe slid around his neck were gentle, encouraging, and Machiavelli’s pulse galloped when Volpe bent to kiss his hair, fingertips stroking the shell of his ear.

“You’re distracting me,” he murmured, pressing his mouth to Volpe’s stomach to hide his desperate attempts to steady his breathing.

“For years I’ve dreamt of touching you like this,” Volpe replied, his voice equally soft, almost reverent. “Don’t deny me now.”

Machiavelli tugged the thief’s shirt free of his trousers, hesitated a moment, lingering on Volpe’s hips, before he slid his palms up the firm line of his lover’s waist until his palms touched warm skin. Volpe shivered, pressed into him, and Niccolò felt the heat of a swelling erection through the older man’s trousers. The urge to press his mouth to Volpe’s need was almost overpowering for a moment, but he marshalled his willpower and focused on running his hands up the thief’s torso, exploring him beneath his shirt.

He had seen Volpe’s scars before, mostly by candlelight—to touch them was something else entirely. The scar tissue was mostly smooth, stretched taut over bone. Niccolò tried not to, but he lingered over the old injuries, morbidly fascinated by them.

Volpe’s hand covered his, and the thief’s mouth brushed his brow. “Don’t,” he said, a soft, simple request, and Machiavelli leaned up to kiss him firmly before withdrawing his hands and turning his attentions to the laces of Volpe’s shirt, undoing them with deft motions that left Volpe exquisitely bared before him. Volpe’s impatience apparently won out, and he leaned back to hike the shirt over his head and tossed it aside before leaning down for another hungry kiss.

His hand caught Machiavelli’s and, in a move that reminded Niccolò achingly of their first night with Tessa—their first night in a bed together—he guided Niccolò’s touch between his own legs. He was hard, startlingly so; Machiavelli traced the outline of the thief’s cock with a grin before tugging Volpe close with a hand against his lower back so he could kiss and bite bruises into Volpe’s stomach.

“You want me,” he said, delighted, smothering his smile against the thief’s skin.

“Was there ever a doubt?”

“A touch,” Machiavelli admitted.

Volpe hummed, smoothed a hand through Machiavelli’s hair. “Surely you never doubted that you are worthy of my desire.”

Machiavelli opened his mouth to protest—of _course_ he thought himself worthy, he was no blushing virgin, after all, but very nearly Volpe’s equal, the brotherhood’s interim mentor, a member of the Signoria of the Republic of Florence and an ambassador to the pope’s court—but then he swallowed.

“Perhaps I did.”

Volpe surprised him then, wrapped an arm around Niccolò’s waist and tugged him down so suddenly that Machiavelli yelped as he collapsed to his back. In a moment, he was no longer holding the thief in his lap—Volpe was stretched over him, pinning him, smiling down at his stunned expression.

“You,” Volpe murmured, his hand catching Niccolò’s jaw, cradling it, “are all I have wanted from the moment I laid eyes on you.”

Machiavelli struggled a little to process that. “Why, then, all this business of sharing women? And when I was with Fabrizzia, Vincenzo, Fioretta—you didn’t seem even a bit jealous.”

“I wasn’t,” Volpe said, and shrugged. “I was going to have you eventually. What occupied you in the meanwhile was of no consequence.”

Machiavelli groaned and scrubbed a hand over his face. “Your arrogance is just… really, _really_ something else.”

“You’re not one to talk, _caro_.” Volpe’s purring mouth descended on his neck, kissing, biting, and Niccolò couldn’t help but grip the thief’s shoulders, pulling his lower lip between his teeth to keep from moaning. “I’m grateful to your other lovers. They helped your heart grow. As for the women, and the waiting… well, what can I say but that I wanted to take my time? To know you first.” He drew back, a smile on his face, and his thumb caressed Machiavelli’s mouth. “You’re my friend. I wouldn’t change a moment of it, _amico_ , any of it, even if I could.”

Machiavelli shrugged, trailing his hands up and down Volpe’s arms. “Not even our first kiss?”

“You mean our first kiss atop the bell tower, overlooking all of the city we so love, while the sun set behind us?” Volpe said, mock-hurt, and Machiavelli laughed. The thief nuzzled his temple, kissed a soft path along his hairline to his brow. “No, beloved. Not even our first kiss. If it hadn’t transpired as it did, God only knows how much longer I’d have been forced to wait for you to finally be honest about how you felt.”

Machiavelli grunted, felt his cheeks redden. “God. How long have you known?”

“Since before you did, I’m sure.”

That was probably true. Machiavelli hadn’t had a name for the way Volpe made him feel until they’d kissed in front of Fioretta, and even then, had tried a little longer to lie to himself. It was disconcerting and thrilling both to realize that Volpe already knew his heart so intimately, better than he knew it himself.

Volpe’s hips suddenly rocked down against his, and Machiavelli inhaled sharply at the sensation of the thief’s cock pressing against his crotch. “You were in the middle of something, I believe,” Volpe purred in his ear, and Machiavelli placed his shaking hands between his lover’s legs, fumbled with the laces of his trousers. Volpe shifted to the side just long enough to slide his hose down his legs—he hadn’t bothered, apparently, with smallclothes—before covering Niccolò’s body again with his own, leaning down to steal a kiss that left Machiavelli light-headed when they parted nearly a minute later.

“I’m almost reluctant to undress you,” Volpe said, chuckling. “You look so damn handsome.”

“Indeed?”

“Quite,” Volpe said, mimicking his lofty affectation, and Niccolò rolled his eyes. “This doublet especially. I’ve never seen you in blue. It’s terribly dashing.”

Oh. Well, shit. He owed Margherita one. “I’m glad it pleases you, then.”

“Pleases me is one way of putting it, I suppose.”

“How would you put it?”

Volpe’s reply was a husky whisper against Niccolò’s pulse. “I want to tear it off you with my teeth.”

Machiavelli shuddered, hands tightening around Volpe’s back, and a moan slipped from his mouth when the thief’s hand cupped his crotch. “Do it, then,” he mumbled.

He knew the thief was talented with his mouth—he’d seen the sinful thing in action enough times, had seen it bring countless lovers to unprecedented heights of pleasure. Seeing it did not even remotely compare to the sensation of Volpe’s mouth on _him_ , to the ecstatic softness of the thief’s lips and tongue punctuated by the sharpness of his teeth. Every kiss and accompanying bite toed the knife-fine margin between pleasure and pain so carefully that Machiavelli was a trembling mess even before Volpe’s mouth finally found the laces of his doublet and began to pull them apart. The hand on his cock was a persistent pressure, just short of the force he needed, and he found himself rocking against it in a desperate attempt to find relief.

“So impatient,” Volpe crooned, and Machiavelli outright groaned when the thief withdrew his hand. “Didn’t I tell you I planned on taking my time?”

“And I told you I’ve had enough of the waiting,” Machiavelli bit back.

Volpe chuckled against his chest. A wet tongue swept across his nipple, and Machiavelli squirmed. “How would you have it, then?”

“I want my clothes off, damn it.”

“Naturally. And what then? My mouth?” Volpe’s teeth closed in. “Perhaps my ass?”

Niccolò swallowed thickly and shook his head. “In me.”

“Hm? I couldn’t quite hear you.”

Machiavelli scowled down at him. Volpe grasped his chin, smiling his wide, wolfish grin.

“Same rules as with our girls, Machia. You need to tell me what you want.”

Niccolò clicked his tongue against the back of his teeth, summoning his courage, and answered at length, “I want you in me.”

“More specific, please.”

“I want your _cock_ in me,” Machiavelli retorted, his cheeks burning, and Volpe’s grin widened, impossibly.

“Not my tongue first? Nor my fingers?”

Machiavelli couldn’t meet his gaze any longer—it was simply too intense. He looked away, and fairly whimpered when Volpe seized his face in one strong hand and forced Machiavelli to look at him again. “Both,” Niccolò mumbled, helpless, “all of it. All of you.” He hesitated, and then bit out, “Please.”

Volpe’s eyes darkened, lips parting, and the kiss he pressed to Niccolò’s mouth as he continued to pull the assassin’s clothes free was nothing short of molten. By the time his clothes were finally shed Niccolò was panting, running desperate touches up Volpe’s sides and back as the thief kissed a burning path down his chest and stomach.

“ _Caro mio_ ,” Volpe breathed, and then his tongue was hot and slick along the underside of Machiavelli’s cock. Their eyes met when Volpe circled his tongue around the swollen head, and Machiavelli dropped his head back against the pillow, smothering a moan behind his hand. “Look at me,” Volpe said sharply, and Niccolò forced himself to obey. Volpe cradled his lover’s cock in his palm, pressing urgent kisses to its length, nuzzling his face against it, worshipful. Niccolò couldn’t recall a time he’d ever been held like that, by anyone. Ever.

Suddenly the vision before him blurred—it actually took a moment for him to realize that his eyes had welled with tears. He clapped a hand over his eyes, wiping at them furiously, waving a hand in rapid dismissal when he felt Volpe’s mouth leave his skin.

“No,” he said, but his voice broke, and he shuddered. “It’s nothing—it’s _nothing_ , I’m sorry—”

But Volpe was already climbing back up the bed, covering him with his body, pulling his hand from his face. Machiavelli swallowed the sudden heaviness in his throat and flinched away from the hand Volpe touched to his cheek.

“Shh, shh, _caro_ ,” Volpe soothed, his voice so soft and so impossibly tender that Machiavelli had to bite down an actual sob. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

“I—” Machiavelli began, swallowed, blinked hard to rid himself of those infuriating tears. “I’m sorry.”

“I don’t want you to apologize. I want you to tell me why you’re upset.”

“I’m not _upset_.”

Volpe sighed, not impatiently. “Then tell me what you’re thinking.”

After a few more false starts, Niccolò bit out a soft “Fuck” and drew a struggling breath. “I can’t stop—remembering. You, with all those women we shared. I’ve seen you with scores of lovers, a hundred or more.”

“And now,” Volpe said, speaking carefully, “they’re my lovers no longer.”

“I need to know that this is—is different. If it’s not, I—I can’t.”

Volpe stared down at him for what seemed a long time, his expression unreadable, his gaze dark, somehow thunderous—fierce. Niccolò stroked a few dark curls behind the thief’s ear, trailed his trembling fingertips along Volpe’s jaw. Volpe turned his head and caught Machiavelli’s wrist, pressed a firm kiss to his palm.

“Turn over,” he said, his voice low and heated, and Niccolò shivered.

“Why?”

“Because it’s different.” Volpe looked at him, and the look in his eyes burned so hot that Niccolò could feel it on his skin. “I’ve tried to tell you as much, and you can’t seem to hear me. So I’m going to show you.”

Niccolò rolled over. Volpe pressed down against his back, swept a hand around his jaw and forced his face up while he placed searing kisses along Niccolò’s neck, his shoulder, his back. The thief’s fingertips curled against his lower lip, pulled his mouth open, and Niccolò whimpered when Volpe’s fingers slid along his tongue.

“You’re mine,” Volpe murmured, whispered it against the highest point of Machiavelli’s spine. “You were mine the moment we met. Mine when we laid with Tessa, mine when you were in Vincenzo’s bed, mine when you were nearly engaged to Fioretta, mine atop that bell tower. You are mine tonight, tomorrow, and the day after. There is no treasure in this world that I can’t have should I decide I desire it, Niccolò dei Machiavelli, and you are no exception.”

Machiavelli shuddered. Volpe’s wet fingers withdrew from his mouth and went to the cleft of his ass, massaging him gently, circling his hole. When the thief’s middle finger slipped inside him, Niccolò cried out with abandon into the mattress.

“Fuck me,” he gasped, arching his ass back into Volpe’s hand. “Volpe, _please_ —”

“We’re making love, _tesoro_.” Volpe’s voice was hushed, reverent. “All night. _That’s_ the difference.”

He withdrew his finger and spread Niccolò’s ass between his hands, hummed his satisfaction at whatever he saw. “You have an exceedingly pretty little cunt,” he said, his voice purring.

Machiavelli hissed at him. “Don’t call it that!”

“I don’t share your taste for words that belie the point.” Volpe’s weight settled on Niccolò’s legs. “Quit squirming.”

“Vulgar,” Machiavelli grumbled, pressing his heated cheeks into the nearest pillow, and then muffled an embarrassingly loud moan into the downy fabric when Volpe’s mouth descended hot and wet between his legs, just behind his balls. “Oh, _fuck_ …”

“Stop hiding,” Volpe laughed, reaching up the bed to grasp the pillow and tug it away from Niccolò’s grasping arms. “I want to hear you.”

Volpe’s oral fixation wasn’t news—Niccolò had certainly seen the thief attempt to devour enough of their lovers to know that the thief loved with his mouth first and everything else second—but to be on the receiving end of his attentions was something else entirely. He licked, bit, kissed, sucked where the skin was softest and most sensitive until Niccolò was sure the array of bruises blooming between his legs made an impressive sight.

“You like it here, hm?” Volpe murmured, sounding infuriatingly pleased with himself, and pressed several wet kisses to the tender, swollen stretch of skin between Niccolò’s balls and hole.

“It’s good,” Niccolò admitted, breathless, hands opening and closing in helpless desperation against the coverlet beneath them. “No one’s ever…”

“Irritating, isn’t it, how single-minded men can be.” Volpe kissed the spot again, then slid a hand beneath Niccolò’s hips to stroke his cock. Machiavelli jumped; he’d entirely forgotten about the rest of his intimate anatomy, transfixed by the deluge of new sensations Volpe was coaxing out between his legs. “Leonardo, good student of bodies that he is, was helpful in correcting my own oversight. I learned plenty through my own experiments, of course.”

“Scintillating,” Machiavelli drawled, rocking his ass back into the thief’s mouth, and Volpe laughed.

And then the thief’s tongue pressed into him, very much unexpectedly, and Niccolò sucked in a sharp breath and held it, squeezing his eyes shut against the intensity of the sensation—Volpe’s wet tongue slicking him softly, Volpe’s strong hands holding him open. Machiavelli found himself trembling, struggled to anchor himself by gripping the headboard, but he was slipping, his breath becoming unsteady, stars popping in his vision.

“Volpe,” he breathed, rocked his hips, choked out a groan. He couldn’t come from just this—impossible. He’d never climaxed without a warm hand or slick cunt around his cock—ever. But Volpe’s fingertips found that softness between his legs again, began massaging, pressing hard, _in_ , and between that and that hot tongue and the just the barest kiss of the silky coverlet against his cock when he thrust his hips—Niccolò came with a cry that sounded somehow broken, animal, spilling wet heat across the bed, every muscle in his lower body contracting tight, pulsing.

He was still shuddering, weakly rubbing his cock against the bed, through the slick mess he’d made, when Volpe’s hand wound into his hair and tugged his head back. The thief pressed against his back, smothering kisses into his hair.

“Beautiful,” Volpe said, his voice choked. “Just beautiful, _caro._ ”

“I’ve never…” Machiavelli broke off, sucking air into his lungs. He felt light-headed, winded, like Volpe had just forced him to scramble up that damn tower again. “ _Fuck_.”

La Volpe laughed then, a rich, ringing sound that entirely filled the small house with its warmth. “Such eloquence.”

“Oh, shut up.”

Volpe kept laughing, kept right on laughing as he pressed his erection against Niccolò’s ass and rocked his hips—when those chuckles finally died out it was only because they had petered into moans. He finally—finally!—sounded as undone as Niccolò felt, as needy, and when Niccolò reached back to hold himself open and let the thief’s cock slip wetly along his hole, Volpe’s groan vibrated hot against his shoulder.

“Can I…?”

It was Niccolò’s turn to laugh, breathless. “God, yes.”

Volpe gripped his jaw again and lifted it, pressed messy kisses to his cheek, then released him to reach past his head for the bedside table. Fumbling in a drawer, Volpe withdrew a bottle of oil, gave it a merry sloshing in Niccolò’s ear, a tease, before Niccolò turned his head to nip at the thief’s fingers. Volpe laughed as he sat up, perched almost jauntily on the backs of his lover’s thighs, and Niccolò shivered at the sensation of the slick substance trickling over his ass, down between his legs, pooling in the curve of his lower back.

Volpe’s cock was blood-hot and pulsing faintly where it pushed against him. There was no attempt at penetration; Volpe only rubbed his length along Niccolò’s slick skin, humming and stuttering out little moans every so often.

Impatient, Machiavelli wriggled, trying to dislodge the thief’s weight, but of course it was to no avail. “Do you plan to rut against me all night, or—” His snipped question escalated into a sharp gasp when Volpe pushed a thumb into him without further preamble. Volpe stretched him, held him open and checked the stretch against the tip of his cock while Niccolò struggled and swore beneath him.

“You’re not as well used as you led me to believe.”

Machiavelli released a frustrated huff. “Only you could make that sound like an insult.”

“I meant no insult. I only wonder why you would deliberately give me the notion that you’ve had more men than you have.”

Niccolò ground his teeth. Infuriating, this habit of Volpe’s of seeing straight through him to all the things he didn’t want to face about _himself_ , much less disclose to the man who held his heart, leaving it as vulnerable as a hare in…well, in a fox’s jaws. “I hate it—the way you treat me like I’m so much younger than you.”

“I regret to report that you _are,_ in fact, so much younger than me.”

“How much?”

“Enough.” It wasn’t clear whether that was an answer or an end to the conversation, but it hardly mattered, for Volpe pushed two fingers into him, and all of Niccolò’s mental exertion went to keeping from moaning his desperation. Somehow, doing so would have felt like letting the thief win. “Who was the last man to have you?”

“Vincenzo,” Niccolò admitted.

“So it’s been months.”

“Yes.”

“And how was his size?”

Niccolò huffed into the pillow. “Adequate.”

Volpe chuckled, a low, dark sound, thrilling. “And you would rate me…?” Perhaps to provide a reminder, he pressed the tip of his cock to Niccolò’s hole, and the girth that little touch anticipated made Niccolò’s insides quiver.

“Rather…more than adequate.”

“You certainly do know how to flatter an old man.” Volpe abruptly released him, swinging his weight from Niccolò’s thighs and crawling up the bed. Niccolò pushed himself onto his elbows, curious, frowning when Volpe propped himself upright against the headboard and patted his lap.

“You don’t want me like this?”

“At some point.” Volpe touched his face. “I prefer to kiss when I fuck. And I would see your face.”

Niccolò’s cheek flushed under the thief’s hand, and he turned his face quickly to kiss the weathered palm before climbing shakily to his hands and knees. He paused, and with his face just above level with the thief’s crotch, took a moment to lean down and taste Volpe’s cock. The older man gripped his hair and tugged his head up with a weak laugh.

“Too far gone for that, Machia. It will have to wait.”

“I’m good at it.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.” Volpe took him by the arms and tugged on him, and with some reluctance Machiavelli climbed into the thief’s lap. Volpe planted hands on either side of his ass and lifted him briefly so they could both get more comfortable, and when they were chest to chest, cocks resting against one another’s stomachs, Niccolò suddenly better understood why Volpe might want him in this position. It was extraordinarily intimate, almost devastatingly so, to be able to look at the thief’s face, let their foreheads touch and almost share breath, while Volpe’s oil-slick palm enclosed both their cocks and began to stroke gently.

“God,” Niccolò breathed, slipping his arms around Volpe’s shoulders to hold him close. His mouth fell open, soft sighs tumbling out of his throat, gaze transfixed by the sight of Volpe touching them, holding them together. He couldn’t match Volpe for length or girth, but he thought he had him beat at aesthetics, at least.

“It’s not a competition,” Volpe said, voice full of mirth, and Niccolò looked up at him quickly. “Not when it’s the two of us.”

Machiavelli quirked an eyebrow. “And when it’s more than the two of us?”

“Well.” Volpe’s grin turned smug. “You may make them weep with the sweetness of your hips, Machia, but they always screamed for the fox.”

He wasn’t even wrong—that was the worst part of it. No, actually, the worst part of it was that he was so eager to be the one screaming on that cock that he couldn’t even be bothered to feel irate about the jab to his pride. Niccolò tightened his grip on the thief’s shoulders and pressed a heated kiss to his mouth, swallowing Volpe’s little pleased note of surprise. Volpe’s free hand wrapped around the back of his neck and squeezed, and its twin held their cocks tightly for a moment.

And then those warm hands were back on his ass, urging him to lift his hips so Volpe could slip his cock between Niccolò’s legs and around his hole. The tip caught, pressed him open a little, and Niccolò whimpered and rocked his hips down.

“Easy,” Volpe breathed, catching him by the hips and holding him back up. “Easy, _caro_ , gentle…shh, let me.”

“I want—”

“Hush, I know. And you shall have it.”

Volpe’s fingers pressed inside him again, thrusting into him, and Niccolò clenched as tightly as he could around the intrusion to signal his readiness. The fingers withdrew, and the thief’s cockhead pressed against him again. Niccolò scrabbled to press his body flush to his lover’s, tangling a hand in Volpe’s dark hair and keeping the other wrapped around his shoulders.

Then Volpe pressed up, inside, and Niccolò couldn’t contain the cry that escaped him, more wild excitement than either pleasure or pain, just giving voice to the sense of surging joy inside him that he and Volpe were finally, _finally_ —

“Down,” Volpe panted, voice trembling, and Niccolò began to lower himself onto the thief’s cock. He rolled and shifted his hips, struggling to relax, and endured a few short thrusts of Volpe’s hips into his ass before the burning stretch became uncomfortable enough that he pressed a hand to Volpe’s chest to halt him.

“Alright?”

“Yes—how much have I got?”

Volpe’s shaking fingertips slipped between them. “Mm. Halfway. You’re doing beautifully, _caro_.”

“Give me a moment.”

“Of course.” Volpe’s hand returned to his cock, stroking lightly—not nearly enough to give him what he wanted, but certainly enough that Niccolò was distracted from the pain in his arse. The thief’s breathing was finally uneven, his cheeks flushed. The smile on his face was almost transcendent.

In a moment of near-furious clarity, Niccolò decided he couldn’t wait any longer. He took a breath and sank down, bit hard into Volpe’s shoulder to smother the gasp of pain the sudden penetration nearly punched from his guts. Volpe’s echoing gasp was entirely another beast, wrenched from somewhere deep in his chest, and his hands skated from Niccolò’s hips to wrap around his back, clutching him hard.

“Oh, _God_ ,” Volpe hissed, his breath stuttering, nails digging into Niccolò’s skin, “oh God, fuck, you’re so _tight_ —Christ in heaven, you might as well be a virgin, you—”

Niccolò circled his hips, grinding his teeth as he sought an angle that would turn that slick burn toward pleasure, and Volpe’s words bubbled away into a weak moan. He had gone almost boneless beneath the younger man, trembling, and he ducked his head to press his mouth to Niccolò’s neck and gasp wetly against his racing pulse.

“Everything I dreamed,” he murmured.

Experimentally, Niccolò—with reluctance—disentangled his arms from around the thief’s shoulders and braced his hands behind him, on Volpe’s knees. He let his lower back arch, inhaling slowly, and rocked his hips. The new angle was tighter, somehow, but fit the bend of his body better, and he felt the tension trickling away from his muscles as he used the leverage from his bent legs to work his ass up and down Volpe’s cock in small motions that spread him slowly.

Volpe’s hands framed his face, caressing, then slid down his chest, his stomach, to grip his hips, help him move. The thief’s expression was almost heart-stoppingly beautiful, lips parted, pupils dilated, his cheeks and brow flushed, a trickle of sweat in his hairline.

“How does it feel?” he asked, his voice cracking. His palm slid along Niccolò’s cock, swept around the head to gather the dribbling fluid collecting there and smear it along the entire length so the next pass of his hand was warm and wet, tugging a moan from Niccolò’s mouth.

“Better.” Niccolò rocked his hips, and the head of Volpe’s cock prodded something within him, deep and swollen and aching, that made a groan shudder past his lips. “Good.”

“You feel exquisite.” Trembling, bracing his weight on one hand, Machiavelli reached with his other and slid his thumb along Volpe’s lower lip, whimpered when the thief’s mouth opened greedily to accept it. “You feel _divine_.”

Niccolò laughed, didn’t mind that his voice shook. “Just an ass.”

“God, no. So slick, so soft. Smooth as silk.” Volpe’s hips pushed up. “Clench your cunt for me.”

“I _told_ you not to—”

“Hush _, caro_ , do as I tell you. Squeeze.”

Niccolò’s affronted frown vanished when he obeyed—doing so as Volpe thrust into him sent the thief’s cockhead skating alongside the spot he’d teased earlier, and this time Niccolò’s insides lit up, and he gasped his shock, blinking rapidly. Volpe’s grin was infuriatingly self-satisfied, and Niccolò couldn’t bring himself to care a bit.

“Good?”

“ _Again_.”

Volpe obliged him, and Niccolò really did cry out then, loud and shameless, wriggling his hips in a desperate attempt to reignite that sensation when it had passed. He tried to speak and failed, had to pause and draw in several steadying breaths while Volpe chuckled at his helplessness and fondled his weeping cock.

“What was… what…”

“The secret of pleasure between men,” Volpe all but purred, and then he drew Niccolò close, pressing their bodies flush again. He reached down and took hold of Niccolò’s ankles, tugged, helped Niccolò straighten his legs and then wrap them around the thief’s hips instead of keeping them tucked beneath himself. “I’ll show you more in-depth later. Just my fingers, perhaps. You can even come from it.”

“Just from that?”

“Just from that.” Volpe kissed him, a short, sweet little thing. “Have your lovers shown you nothing?”

“Evidently not,” Niccolò said, still dazed. He squeezed his ass around Volpe’s cock again, releasing a plaintive little whimper when Volpe didn’t indulge him as before. “Please?”

“Oh, listen to you,” Volpe laughed, and kissed him again, longer, lingering. “So sweet. I’ve something else in mind for you.”

Volpe wrapped both arms around them and twisted his hips, and Machiavelli yelped as he found himself lifted up, backward, pressed suddenly onto his back on the opposite end of the bed with Volpe looming over him. The thief had readjusted them without separating them, and Niccolò didn’t even have time to voice his irritation at being manhandled before Volpe’s hips rolled, pressing his cock in deep. Niccolò’s complaint died in his throat; his eyes widened, and he scrabbled to grip the thief’s forearms, flexed and strong, holding him over his lover.

“Hands behind your knees,” Volpe murmured, his voice dripping lust, and Niccolò hurried to obey. “Good boy. Hold yourself open for me.”

Niccolò did, and a long, hard thrust pushed a warbled sound from his mouth somewhere between a moan and a sob. Volpe shifted, braced his arms instead behind Niccolò’s drawn-up knees to help support him. His thrust in once, twice, very slowly, very deep, and Niccolò’s eyes rolled up and drifted closed, his toes curling.

“You are,” Volpe breathed, and bent his head to kiss the side of Niccolò’s neck, tongue working over bruises he’d left earlier, “beyond a shadow of a doubt, the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.”

“V-Volpe.”

“My name.” Volpe’s teeth bit into his pulse. “Call my name.”

Niccolò tangled his hands into the thief’s hair, blinking his eyes open blearily. He could hardly think around the deluge of sensation radiating from his core. “Gilberto,” he mumbled, and la Volpe’s hips _lunged_ forward, pressing his cock so deep and so hard that Niccolò saw white. He released Volpe’s hair, suddenly afraid he’d rip it from the poor fool’s skull in the throes of passion, and clutched his shoulders instead, holding onto him for dear life when the thief thrust into him again. “Gilberto.”

If this was what Volpe—Gilberto—meant by _making love_ as opposed to _fucking_ , Niccolò never wanted to return to the latter. He wanted this, forever, this man pressing him to the bed, filling him hard and deep, over and over again, but so _slow_ , as if they had all the world’s hours to themselves.

A hand tangled in his hair, tipped his chin back, and Gilberto kissed him, a messy, heated thing, open-mouthed. Gilberto’s eyes were hazy, unfocused, but open, gazing down at him with an expression of such intense adoration, such unapologetic desire, that Niccolò felt that last little niggling bit of doubt in his chest sputter out like a candle exposed to a sudden breeze. The uncertainty simply bled from him, massaged out of his clenching muscles by the press of Volpe’s body into his, and he leaned up to steal another desperate kiss. Gilberto reciprocated with a moan that Niccolò caught on his tongue and tucked against the roof of his lover’s mouth.

“ _Mine_ ,” Gilberto breathed.

And Niccolò nodded, kissed him again, fiercely. “Yours.”

He couldn’t hang on much past that, and when he came, it started as a white-hot tangle deep inside that diffused outward, shaking his insides and sending tremors through his limbs. Volpe suddenly let his legs drop, and Niccolò rocked up to meet the thrusts that separated their climaxes, let Volpe press his pulsing cock again and again into the aching heat of the younger man’s cunt.

“In me,” Niccolò gasped, tangling his hands in his lover’s hair, cradling him close, “in me, Gilberto, please—” and Gilberto spilled in him with a loud, stuttering moan, hips pressing into him, holding steady at last. They kept moving together after, wringing their coupling for every drop of pleasure they could, until Niccolò felt scraped raw and the bruises on his ass where Volpe’s hips had drummed against him began to ache too intensely to bear.

Volpe lay on top of him for what seemed a long while, his breathing slowly evening out, hot and damp against Niccolò’s throat. Finally, the thief lifted his head, smiled the way only an exhausted and sated man can, leaned down to claim a wearied, lingering kiss.

“Different,” he declared, and Niccolò smiled to match him. He caressed the thief’s face, his mouth, stroked Gilberto’s hair from his brow.

“Yes. Different.”

Volpe pushed himself up with a groan and patted Niccolò’s flank. “Roll over.”

Niccolò obeyed, turning over onto his side, and Volpe slipped in behind him, fit against him so perfectly that, with their legs tangled and Gilberto’s arm around his waist, it was as if they’d been made to lay entwined so. Volpe’s cock twitched where it pressed into his ass, and Niccolò smiled faintly. He normally hated the sensation of another sweat-slick body pressed against his after sex, especially hated feeling cum dripping from his hole and making a mess of the cleft of his ass, but when Volpe’s fingers slipped between his legs to feel the aftermath of their coupling, Niccolò all but purred and arched his lower back to offer a deeper touch.

“Beautiful,” Volpe proclaimed, once again, and squeezed him close to press kisses into his hair, across his nape, to nip at his ear. He slipped a finger inside, caressing, probing until Niccolò’s thighs quivered and he spilled a liquid moan across the pillow. “How long until you can go again?”

Niccolò laughed shakily. “More than five minutes, Gilberto.”

The thief hummed, perhaps relenting, and for a while Niccolò dozed in the older man’s arms, entirely contented to be held, caressed. Gilberto’s fingers continued to press into him, working him open, keeping him stretched—he really did intend for them to love together all night. Niccolò found he didn’t mind—on the contrary, when Volpe began to press into him again after nearly a half hour of exquisitely gentle fingering, Niccolò eased himself back onto the thief’s cock and greedily took what he was offered.

“Do you still want dinner?” Volpe asked suddenly. Niccolò blinked his eyes open, squinted through the dim firelight at the table laden with food, and laughed.

“It’ll be cold.”

Volpe shrugged. His hips began to move, rocking in slow, undulating circles against Niccolò’s ass. “Glass of wine, then?”

Niccolò turned his head to look over his shoulder at the other man, and his face broke into a wide grin. Gilberto pulled him close and leaned down to kiss him. The wine bottle on the table glinted a little in the dying candlelight, and for a while yet was very much forgotten.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> remember to leave comments for your local content creators


	3. Bonus - Gilberto

Gilberto had been alone for so long that he simply did not remember a point in his life when he had been otherwise. His childhood had been in no way distinct from that of any of the other urchins, orphans, and otherwise abandoned children who begged on the streets and hid from the rain in low doorways all across Italy. He did not even remember who had first called him Gilberto, only that the name had been the first thing he’d ever had—the first thing that was ever his.

He had been unable to stop making things his ever since.

It was a miracle, perhaps, that he had even survived. He’d had no mentors, no teachers—he learned to steal as a matter of necessity. Small things first, food from poorly managed stands at busy markets, florins that escaped beneath tavern tables while patrons gambled. Learning to pick pockets was much harder—he still bore the scars his clumsy fingers had occasionally earned him. He learned fast to prioritize women, whose purses were harder to get at, but who were much less likely to beat him if they caught him in the attempt.

He did not remember any city except Florence, and never tried to leave—not because anything in particular kept him there, but because he could think of no good reason to go elsewhere. What would Rome have that Florence didn’t, except a larger populace with more beggars and more thieves to compete against? No, if he had to be destitute, best to do it in Firenze, where at least the nobility politely averted their eyes from the ugly truth of the starving, impoverished bodies atop which they built their monuments, their governments, their banks.

The first real kindness Gilberto remembered receiving had been from a rabbi in the Jewish ghetto—Rebbe Mordechai, who had an immense beard and a raspy, booming laugh that Gilberto sometimes still heard in his dreams. He had a place to sleep in the synagogue in the ghetto, and even if most of its attendees weren’t particularly kind, they were not hostile either, and more often than not they looked the other way when some small trinket disappeared from their pockets.

Paradoxically, thieving grew harder as he grew older. Children were overlooked; dark-haired young men who took to the shadows and wore hoods to obscure their faces always seemed suspect. All the same, it took a few beatings from guards, both warranted and unprovoked, before Gilberto realized that thief hidden in plain sight, who knew how to work a crowd, was infinitely more likely to succeed than the thief who haunted alleyways and tried to isolate stragglers going home alone in the dark. People cornered were unpredictable, violent—it only took one instance of a knife in his ribs to learn that lesson.

He was thirteen when he earned that scar, and frustrated. The hopelessness of his situation had begun to overwhelm him; he almost wished his would-be victim’s blade had bit deeper, put him out of his misery.

“You know,” the rebbe said, as he stitched the new wound, “I have a gentile friend in the city who is good to those of us the rest of the world has seen fit to leave behind. Perhaps you should see him.”

Gilberto had spat upon the floor, and then felt guilty about it. “I don’t want anyone’s pity.”

“Pity? No. That’s not what he has to offer.” Mordechai had bandaged his injury then, and patted his hair. “I’ll give you directions. He has small daughters, so mind your mouth in their presence.”

Gilberto had gone two days later, when his ribs didn’t ache so much—not because he wanted help from the old rebbe’s friend, but because he had a little food in his belly and nothing better to do. The rebbe’s directions led him across the Arno to the Santo Spirito neighborhood. He didn’t spend much time there—it consisted mostly of tightly clustered houses and small palazzos, homes to families who were not noble, precisely, but were substantially more comfortable than Florence’s poor. They kept their valuables not around their necks or in their pockets but hidden away beneath their beds and floorboards, so they were of little interest to an urchin thief.

Rebbe Mordechai’s friend had been expecting him. He was seated outside his front door, cradling a sleeping little girl in one arm and holding a book in his other hand. When Gilberto approached, cautious as a nocturnal animal lured into the daylight, the man lifted his head and smiled. Twenty-three years later, Gilberto would fall in love with a smile that was nearly its twin.

The man had moved a little to the side on the step, put aside his book, and patted the stair. Gilberto did not sit, choosing instead to hover awkwardly in front of this man, having not the faintest clue how to answer his warm smile.

“You’re Mordechai’s young friend,” the man said. He spoke in hushed tones, probably to avoid waking the child sleeping in his arms. Gilberto didn’t often see babes in arms; he looked at her curiously before answering.

“Yes. I’m Gilberto.”

“Gilberto.” The man extended his hand. “Bernardo dei Machiavelli.”

They shook. Gilberto took his hand back and put it and its twin in his pockets. He had hidden a gold chain there, which he hoped to sell later to one of the merchants in the night market. “Rebbe says you have something to offer—you know. People like me.”

“I do.” Bernardo Machiavelli had inclined his head toward the door. “Perhaps you’d like to come in? You look hungry.”

Gilberto was always hungry, and even though he’d eaten that morning at the rebbe’s table, his stomach had growled mightily. He would always remember the way Bernardo had laughed then, not unkindly, but genuinely amused. He had led Gilberto inside and taken the little girl upstairs to her room, leaving the young thief to stand in his parlor, hopelessly out of place.

Bernardo came back downstairs, and, still smiling, led Gilberto into the kitchen. A woman was cooking there—Gilberto assumed she was Bernardo’s wife, and the moment she caught sight of them she began chastising Bernardo for the state of his clothes, which were rumpled and unkempt. Bernardo endured her chiding with that same easy smile, even kissed her cheek when she was done. She was pregnant—Gilberto knew at once because he often sought out pregnant women specifically, who were too distracted by the great burden of their bodies to pay much attention to their pockets. She walked with a bit of a bow-legged stagger, and kept pressing her hand to the underside of her obviously swollen belly.

“When is the baby coming?” he asked, out of genuine curiosity, and she grimaced at him.

“Bernardo, you bring yet more creatures to our home.”

“This is Gilberto.” Bernardo had placed a hand on his shoulder, and there had been a peculiar strength in that touch, like he was telling Gilberto to stand his ground. “You know my friend Mordechai? Gilberto is in his care. Gilberto, this is my wife, _Madonna_ Bartolomea.”

Bartolomea had made a sniffing sound. “Well, Gilberto. You’re very skinny. Don’t you eat?”

“When I can,” he retorted.

She’d had the decency to look embarrassed, at least, and was warmer toward him afterward. And she was generous with her food; the table she set was laden, and Gilberto didn’t wait for an invitation to pile his plate and dig in. Bernardo chuckled at him, and his wife merely grumbled about the manners of Florence’s youth before shuffling back to the fire to prepare seconds.

A different girl came down the stairs when she smelled food, and climbed up into the chair beside her father without so much as a glance at Gilberto. Bernardo stroked her hair and introduced her as Primavera, his eldest. She waved a chubby hand at their guest and then returned to her food.

After they ate, Bernardo took Gilberto upstairs to his study. It wasn’t terribly impressive—he had a little desk piled with papers, a bookshelf populated scarcely by heavy volumes with titles in languages Gilberto didn’t even recognize. He touched the books, and Bernardo watched him with that same faint, kind smile.

“Do you like reading?”

Gilberto shook his head. “I don’t know how.”

“What?” For the first time, Bernardo seemed affronted. “You’ll have to learn.”

“Why?” Gilberto thumbed through a thick tome and put it aside with a shrug. “There’s nothing in here worth knowing.”

“How would you know if you haven’t read it?” Bernardo picked up the abandoned book. “Say your knife is dull, my friend. How would you sharpen it?”

Gilberto rolled his eyes. “A whetstone, obviously.”

“Good. Now let's say your mind is a blade. How do you sharpen it?” Gilberto had only looked at him in confusion, and Bernardo grinned and held up the book. “The answer, _amico_ , is Titus Livy. Have a seat. I’ll give you your letters.”

So Gilberto had learned to read, and then to write. Once or twice a week he ambled to the small palazzo in Santo Spirito, and Bernardo always greeted him with the same enthusiastic warmth, and Bartolomea always fed him, though she always grumbled about his manners (or complete lack thereof). He and Bernardo sat in the study and worked; once Gilberto had his letters, Bernardo set him to work on the abacus, though Gilberto resisted that tutelage mightily.

“I have no head for money,” Bernardo chided, “and therefore possess very little of it. But you, _amico_ , are a thief. The abacus will help you master your fortunes.”

The idea of having more money was appealing, so Gilberto shelved his complaints alongside the ponderous volumes of Livy and Plato and Petrarch and learned his abacus.

“What do you do?” he asked one evening over supper. Two months into his strange tutelage, he stayed later and later, sometimes even spending the night in the nursery being prepared for the baby. He didn’t understand the turn his life had taken, but he also didn’t dislike it. “For work, I mean.”

Bernardo looked at him in surprise. “I haven’t told you? I’m a lawyer.”

Gilberto blinked. “You don’t seem like a lawyer.”

“No? How so?”

“Aren’t lawyers very serious? And rich, and successful. The Medici lawyers live in palazzos four times this size.”

Bartolomea had stared at him, aghast, but Bernardo laughed himself red in the face. “I don’t have a practice,” he said at last, when he had gotten some control over himself, still wiping tears from his eyes. “I provide legal services to a very specific clientele.”

“Like who?” Gilberto asked, but Bernardo had only spooned more meat and carrots onto his young friend’s plate and entreated him to eat.

A month later, while Bernardo helped Gilberto stumble through _La Inferna_ one warm afternoon in early May, Bartolomea came rushing into the study with her hands around her belly. The front of her dress was wet, and her face had gone sheet-white. At once Bernardo had leapt to his feet and taken her in his arms, helping her to the nursery. Primavera and Margherita crowded the door, watching with wide eyes while Bernardo helped his wife into bed and then knelt beside her, stroking her hair and murmuring down at her in soft, soothing tones. He looked, to Gilberto, very afraid.

“Gilberto,” he’d said, and reached for the boy. Gilberto went, let Bernardo grasp his wrist. “Will you do something very important for me?” Gilberto had nodded, and Bernardo smiled gratefully and squeezed his wrist. “Three houses down from ours, there lives an old woman named Lucia. Will you go tell her that the baby is coming?”

Wide-eyed, Gilberto nodded. And then Bartolomea had wailed, curling forward around her belly and clutching it tight, and the girls began crying. Bernardo turned to soothe them, and Gilberto turned and bolted down the stairs, out the front door. At first he went the wrong direction—the third house on the right was home only to a tottering old man and his young daughter. Gilberto sprinted the opposite direction. When he told the old woman who answered the door that she was needed at the Palazzo Machiavelli, she gathered her skirts and took off at a run, not even bothering to close her front door. Gilberto followed.

He hadn’t wanted to go back into the house, so he sat outside the front door and practiced his abacus. Bernardo had gifted him a small one that fit in his shoulder bag, and Gilberto had taken to carrying it with him everywhere. Whenever he pulled more than a few florins from an unsuspecting pocket, he ducked into an alley, withdrew his abacus, and counted his new earnings against the stash he’d begun to save in the rebbe’s study.

It was a terrible afternoon, and it wore on into evening. He heard Bartolomea’s wailing even outside and spent a good hour with his hands around his ears, trying to block her out. He was glad he wasn’t born a woman.

The sun was setting on Florence when the door finally opened, and Bernardo stepped out. He took a seat at Gilberto’s side, and only then did the young thief notice the bundle Bernardo cradled in his arms as carefully as if it were woven from gold. Bernardo, who looked more tired than Gilberto had ever seen him, leaned down so Gilberto could see what he cradled.

“ _Amico_ , would you like to meet my son?”

Gilberto peered at the swaddling. A very small, wet-looking thing lay within. He recoiled, wrinkling his nose. “It’s so ugly.”

Bernardo laughed hugely. “Oh, Niccolò, he doesn’t mean it,” he crooned, and pressed his mouth to the baby’s damp head. It already had a small thatch of fine raven hair.

“Is that his name?”

“Yes. It was my father’s. Niccolò di Bernardo, of the house of Machiavelli. I like the sound of it, don’t you?”

Gilberto shrugged. He’d met probably a hundred Niccolòs in Florence—the name was exceedingly common. But Bernardo looked so absolutely stricken with love as he gazed down at the little thing that Gilberto didn’t have the heart to say so. “Is _Madonna_ Bartolomea alright?”

“She rests now—Lucia watches over her. Thank you for your concern.”

They shared a moment in quiet, both staring at the baby, which made faint little grunts and squirmed its little feet.

“I’ve always wanted a son,” Bernardo marveled. He nestled the baby in the crook of his arm and stroked a thumb over its fat little cheek. It stirred, pushing against the blanket that swaddled it. It—well, _he,_ Gilberto supposed—made a tiny noise, and then began to cry, waving a clenched, purpled fist in his father’s face. Bernardo laughed and began to rock him. “God in heaven, the lungs on him. Shh, shh, _tesoro_ , I’m here. I know.”

Bernardo’s face had softened then, his smile so full of love that Gilberto had felt it in his own chest—and it hurt more fiercely than the blade that had bit into his ribs.

“This is the most frightening the world will ever seem to you, my love,” Bernardo had murmured. “And I promise you won’t remember it.” He had pulled the baby close then and kissed his small head, eyes closed, and rocked Niccolò while he cried. Gilberto watched him for a few moments, then got to his feet, dusted off his breeches, and walked back to the ghetto.

Something about the baby’s arrival made him feel that he was no longer wanted at the Palazzo Machiavelli. Years later he would understand that he had felt replaced, but at the tender age of fourteen, he only felt frustrated, and hurt, and lonely. He had no names for those feelings—they simply roiled around inside his young body, twisted up his stomach and disturbed his sleep.

The rebbe was impressed that he’d learned to read and began to teach him Hebrew. Gilberto acquired it easily, and then snatched up Aramaic as well. He practiced by reading a Jewish bible the rebbe gave him out loud, and the rebbe translated for him. He didn’t understand the rebbe’s long lectures about the hidden meaning of the text, or whatever, but Gilberto liked the stories.

“This is like that story they tell in church,” he commented one night, while the rebbe told him about a boy named Yaakov, who had tricked his father Yitzchak. “Only it’s about Jacob and Isaac. Did the Jews copy it?"

The rebbe had had to clutch the boy’s shoulders to keep from falling over laughing.

Two months after the baby was born, Bernardo came and sought him out in the ghetto. The rebbe greeted him with delight, and they sat in the synagogue’s study and caught up while Gilberto skulked just outside the door. When he and Mordechai had finished speaking, Bernardo opened the door, startling Gilberto, and smiled down at him.

“I haven’t seen you in a long time, _amico_. Did you get bored with studying?”

Even as young as he was, Gilberto recognized the question for what it was—an out. He leapt upon it. “Yes. I don’t want to keep reading _La Inferna_.”

“He studies Torah now,” the rebbe said, sounding a little smug, and Bernardo grinned back at him.

“Ah. Then perhaps I’ll leave your reading to Mordechai’s tutelage. We can study something else, you and I.”

Gilberto quirked his head, curious. “What?”

Bernardo grinned at him. “I wonder, my young friend, whether you’d like to learn swords?”

* * *

Bernardo taught him swords, and then took him to a thief named Antonio, who helped him sharpen his skills, taught him to climb and wield his dagger to greater and deadly effect. Antonio took him to Paola and the courtesans, who so perfected his pickpocketing that by the end of their tutelage, Gilberto was lifting tokens and coin off Bernardo himself with ease, to his mentor’s laughing delight.

Those years, the ones he spent training and studying, going back and forth between the rebbe’s sanctuary in the ghetto and the Palazzo Machiavelli in Santo Spirito, were some of the happiest la Volpe could recall. Niccolò constituted little of those memories—not because he hadn’t been present, but because Gilberto had simply had very little interest in his mentor’s children. He remembered a few sweet moments—Bernardo sitting beside the fire, cradling his little son to his chest, and later, letting little Niccolò clutch his fingers as the boy tried to walk from his father to his mother.

Gilberto’s clearest memory of the boy was the frightening week he had been desperately ill when he was three, his small body wracked with alternating terrible heat and ferocious chills, and he only remembered because Bernardo had brought their training to a complete halt, unwilling to leave his son’s bedside. When Niccolò woke from his fevered slumber and cried, Bernardo dampened his brow and kissed his hair, and read him back to sleep. Gilberto had never known a man to love his son so fiercely; as far as Bernardo seemed concerned, his boy’s tiny frame contained the sun and planets and stars. Gilberto had no doubt that Bernardo cared for him, but he was not Bernardo Machiavelli’s son. Nowhere close.

When Niccolò was recovered, Bernardo had stepped up their training. Gilberto had only sensed that he was being prepared for something, though he didn’t know what, and neither his mentor nor the rebbe were forthcoming.

By age sixteen, he was a fierce thing, strong and stealthy. He had amassed a small fortune in florins he’d plucked from Florentine pockets. The rooftops were his kingdom, his palatial domain high above the heads of the unwitting public. Bernardo was strong with a sword but lacked the young thief’s dexterity, and when they walked the city together Bernardo took the streets while Gilberto bounded overhead.

“Look at you,” Bernardo told him as his training neared its inevitable end, beaming with pride, “as quick and silent as a fox.”

* * *

At sixteen, Gilberto made an important decision, one he felt was a long time coming—he asked the rebbe to make him a Jew.

The rebbe considered him seriously as they sat across from one another in his study. Mordechai had grown old—he had always been old, Gilberto thought, but it was clear that the end of his life was approaching. Mordechai had no sons, no daughters, not even a wife, and while he was beloved in the ghetto for his kind heart and priceless wisdom, he had no successor, no student of his tradition to whom he could pass his knowledge—save for the urchin thief he’d taken in off the streets nearly a decade before.

“You’ll take on the obligations and commitments of my father and his fathers before him, ad infinitum, for nearly six millennia,” Mordechai said, his tone more serious that Gilberto had ever heard it. He nodded. “You’ll keep the Sabbath day, abstain from the flesh of certain animals, commit yourself to a lifetime of contemplation of the Torah.”

Gilberto nodded, nodded, nodded. He already did these things—he rested on Saturdays when Mordechai rested, even abstained from practicing his writing, which Bernardo had permitted with a smile. He had little appetite for pork as it was, and disliked cheese, and where was a man like him to come across the delicate shellfish that so enraptured the rest of Europe? As for the Torah—well, he read it alongside Mordechai anyway, and liked the way contemplation of the old text stretched his brain. He didn’t want to lose his Hebrew, anyway, the gift Mordechai had labored to give him.

“You’ll have to be circumcised,” Mordechai said. Gilberto had balked a bit at that. But he agreed to that, also. After he did, the rebbe had considered him for a long time, and Gilberto sat perfectly still, his determination written on his face. “Why?” Mordechai asked finally. “You see how my people suffer, how we are kept beneath the heel of gentile boots in this city, in Spain… everywhere.” His face softened, and he ran a hand through his great beard. “You have suffered much, Gilberto. Would you shoulder the suffering of my people, as well?”

Gilberto thought a while about that. It was a serious question, and it was owed the fullness of his consideration. Mordechai sat quietly across from him, let him think.

“I don’t understand the Torah very well,” Gilberto admitted at long last. “I don’t understand why you can’t have certain foods, and I certainly don’t understand your god, or why you love him so.”

“And what do you feel for God, Gilberto?”

“Rage,” Gilberto said. “If a god exists who rules over this world, then I resent it. And I know you do too, sometimes.”

“Then why? You would join our covenant with a god you resent?”

“You resent the world, especially gentiles. But when I came to your door, you opened it. You fed me, put clothes on my back, gave me a place to put my head. You never asked for anything in return, never even asked me to be other than I am.” Gilberto looked up at the old man then, and had to swallow around his sudden tears. “I don’t want to be alone. Not forever. If your grace comes from God, Mordechai, then…I at least want a chance.”

Mordechai had gotten to his feet then, drew Gilberto upright as well, held him. Held him a long, long time. In the weeks that followed, Gilberto was circumcised, and recovered; Mordechai prepared a ritual bath and immersed him in it; and at long last he gave Gilberto another name, Yaakov, for the wily young man who tricked his father Yitzchak into handing him the world and then fathered a nation.

Gilberto never had to offer his final reason for wanting to become a Jew—it was simply that, because Mordechai had no children to carry on his legacy, Gilberto would do it in their stead.

When the old man died six months later, Bernardo attended the funeral, the only non-Jew among the throngs of people who came to mourn the rebbe’s passing. Mordechai was buried in the ghetto’s cemetery, in a plot near his father’s. When most of the crowd had dispersed, Gilberto remained, crouched at Mordechai’s graveside and weeping bitterly. He hadn’t cried like that at least since he was a child, and maybe not even then. Bernardo stood nearby—not touching him, leaving him to his grief, but not leaving him alone.

* * *

He was inducted into the brotherhood of assassins a year later. The tenor of his training changed then, radically, for he was given over to Giovanni Auditore, the highest ranking assassin in the city. There were others, Bernardo explained, all over Italy, working in secret against the nefarious tyrants who spilled innocent blood in bids for power. Roma, Venezia, Napoli, the great states of the Romagna… they teemed with men who cared little for the lives they ground beneath their heels as they struggled up the mountains of warfare, of history, of politics, all straining for that summit, glory.

Gilberto didn’t much care what happened to Roma, or Venezia, or Napoli, for that matter—he cared for Firenze, whose most marginal and desperate citizens had shared with him what little they had. He would protect Firenze—he would do that much in return for the life he had been given. The Jews, the courtesans, men like Bernardo who labored fruitlessly and loved their wives and children, men like Giovanni Auditore who used their influence to advocate for those less fortunate—the orphans in the streets, children who may someday share his fate, or meet ones far worse.

He and Bernardo grew apart. There was no falling out, no discord between them—Bernardo was merely aging, and growing his family, and Gilberto became absorbed by his craft, by his work as an assassin and his growing reputation as a t hief. Gilberto was never anything but grateful to the man—Bernardo Machiavelli had given him a life worth living. If Bernardo withdrew from him, from the assassins, so he could eke out some modicum of a peaceful existence with his wife and children, Gilberto could hardly blame him. In his heart, he bid Bernardo farewell, and the rest of the Machiavelli with him.

At least, he did so until he was called to Venezia at last, to help Giovanni Auditore’s son lay claim to his heritage as an assassin. He was la Volpe by then—he had secured his notoriety, heard his name whispered in taverns with equal measures of fear and admiration. He had even outstripped Antonio, his old mentor, and at long last could pick even Paola’s pockets. He was past thirty, more than a man grown, finally in his prime. He could climb any building (and did), plunder any pocket, steal any treasure. There was no thief in all Florence greater than he.

He forgot, in his arrogance, that men are capable of more than the theft of treasures—they are also capable of the theft of hearts.

* * *

Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli was, much to Volpe’s great chagrin, absolutely beautiful. He was not beautiful in the classical way, certainly not like Ezio, but he had his charm and his intelligence and a smile so sharp and so lovely it made Volpe’s heart quiver. It was his father’s smile but edged by cynicism, by a dry wit that emerged only in times of great levity or great duress, and never, it seemed, in between. He was eighteen, really just a child in the grand scheme of it all, but the loss of Giovanni Auditore had broken the brotherhood’s back in Florence, and Niccolò was what they had. He was a boy pretending to be a man, stepping with trembling feet into the role that had been thrust upon him.

Volpe decided from the moment he met the boy that he would hold his tongue about their shared past. What could he say—that he was there the day Niccolò was born, that Niccolò’s father had saved his life and made him an assassin? Niccolò didn’t seem to know, which meant Bernardo had never told him, and for a reason he couldn’t identify even for himself, Gilberto felt inclined to respect his old mentor’s silence.

Besides that, the boy irritated him—he was arrogant, a little prickly, insufferably self-assured despite his youth and inexperience. He had the haughty air of a man who knew he was smart, had been told all his life he was smart, and was now reaping the rewards of his natural talents without having to put in any real effort. For Volpe—who had never had anything, who had fought and worked and suffered for every skill he possessed, who had won every ounce of his considerable reputation—nothing was more irksome than Niccolò’s unearned confidence.

He was also stupidly, miserably, uncontrollably, head over heels in love with the little prat. He knew it from the moment he set eyes upon the boy who looked so gut-wrenchingly like his old mentor—saw the curve of Niccolò’s smug smile and knew he’d never, ever be free of the prodigal son of the house of Machiavelli. Their gazes met for the first time and Volpe’s whole body screamed with the urge to have him, his mind and heart breathing _Mine_ in a sort of sacred unison that was all-consuming and so sure it was as if Volpe had peered into the future and seen how close Fortuna would bring them.

But he was in no hurry. Somewhere in the (near, perhaps?) future, Niccolò became a man that Gilberto would love, but for now he was young and brilliant and intrepid and, more than anything, a fool who was likely to get them all killed. Volpe and the brotherhood’s other seasoned mentors were more or less able to keep Ezio and Niccolò in line. There was no disagreement, none voiced, at least, that those prodigal sons would save their brotherhood, would save all Italy in the process, but there were years lying in wait between Ezio and Niccolò’s awakening and their eventual deliverance of Italy from the hands of the tyrants who plagued it.

* * *

It all happened very quickly, it seemed to Volpe, after Lorenzo de Medici died—suddenly there was a Borgia on the throne of St. Peter, and a French invasion swooping down upon them, and Savonarola’s fires choking the Florentine sky with ash, and Cristoforo Colombo’s bumbling had somehow doubled the size of the world. Niccolò grew very quickly with the times—almost overnight he went from a clever boy to a strategic politico with one foot in Florence and the other in Rome, straddling the politics of his own city while simultaneously struggling to maintain some influence in the holy capital. It happened so quickly, his appointment to the Signoria, his entry into the Borgia court, and his confidence was attenuating when really there was every reason for it to grow.

Volpe felt sorry for him. He, better than anyone, knew what it was to lose one’s youth, to feel one’s innocence and capacity for joy and vigor and whimsy slipping away like so much dust between grasping fingers.

And then his sister died, Primavera, who Volpe only dimly remembered as a chubby-cheeked child who’d once greeted him at a dinner table. He only knew that she had been young, had left behind a small child, and that Niccolò had loved her as fiercely and loyally as a younger brother could love his sister. He hid his devastation well, put his head down and kept to the work, but one night, as Volpe crept through the Signoria to pick through a few of its hidey holes and safes, he heard Niccolò’s anguished sobs, his snarling condemnations of the God who had stolen his sister away.

Volpe stood outside the door of the young man’s office, listening, bearing silent witness to his grief. He also knew what it was to revile God, to feel nothing but the utmost resentment and rage for a creator whom he was meant to love. He tried to remember the things Mordechai had said about such rage, which was simultaneously so malignant and so natural to the troubling state of being human.

He came up with nothing—most of Mordechai’s words were locked away deep inside him, buried beneath his own scars, his own grief, his own loss. Volpe didn’t know what else to do to help, so he did what he did know to do—he brought Machiavelli a bottle of wine.

* * *

When Niccolò turned twenty-four, la Volpe dragged him from his Signoria office, inviting along Biagio and Agostino, his assistants, and got them all absolutely shit-faced, stumblingly drunk. Niccolò needed it, even if he’d never admit it. Volpe brought them from tavern to tavern, got enough wine in them that they were good company, and then the real fun began.

By the night’s end, they’d left Biagio unconscious in a brothel, put Agostino in the care of his cousin, Amerigo Vespucci, who they met at some point along the way, and that left Volpe to carry Machiavelli back to his office literally on his back. Niccolò was sweet when he was drunk, and funny, and Volpe’s shoulders shook with laughter as they trooped across their darkened city toward the Palazzo della Signoria. The cot in Niccolò’s office wasn’t the most comfortable in the world, but it was close by—and anyway, Volpe didn’t want to see Bernardo.

Niccolò’s arms were very tight around his neck for a drunken man. Volpe hiked the young man a little higher up his back, glancing over his shoulder at him. “Alright?”

“Yes,” Niccolò mumbled. His face was tucked into the crook of his arm, and his voice was muffled. “I’m drunk.”

“That you are. Do you feel well?”

“Yes. It’s cath—cuh— _cathar_ —it feels good,” Niccolò supplied, and Volpe laughed.

The Signoria’s guards stopped them at the door, but let them pass when Niccolò swore loudly at them and threatened to vomit on their boots. Volpe sniggered wildly as he carted the younger man up to the second floor.

“You’ll regret that tomorrow, _amico_.”

“I’ll regret all of this tomorrow,” Niccolò moaned. “I’m going to be sick.”

“You are?”

“Wait.” Niccolò paused. “No.”

Volpe rolled his eyes and stepped into the office, closing he door with his foot behind them. He dumped Niccolò on the cot in the back, left him groaning there while he fetched water and a stale half-loaf of bread from the cupboard nearby. He sat on the edge of the bed and watched Niccolò struggle to eat and drink.

“Happy birthday,” he said. Niccolò, munching on the bread, wordlessly extended a hand. Volpe lifted his eyebrows. “What?”

Niccolò swallowed and frowned at him. “You didn’t get me a gift?”

Volpe burst into laughter. “I bought all the wine tonight! And all the brandy, and all the food, _and_ all the women—I’m not made of money, _amico_.”

“I don’t think that’s true,” Niccolò said, pouting, and hid himself behind his water glass while Volpe continued to snigger. Niccolò suddenly leaned down and began fumbling with the laces of his boots, brow furrowed. Volpe snorted and brushed his hands aside.

“Let me, idiot. You’ll knot them worse, state you’re in.”

He pulled Niccolò’s boots free and looked up, sighed—Niccolò had tried to struggle out of his shirt and gotten himself lost in the linen somewhere halfway through. Volpe leaned forward and helped him out of it.

“Thank you.”

“You’re very welcome.” Niccolò began to tug on his breeches, and Volpe hurriedly caught his wrists. “Wait, wait—you’ll regret it in the morning when Antonio comes in and finds you bare-ass and hungover in your office.”

“Antonio can eat my arse,” Niccolò retorted, but gave up on his breeches all the same and searched for the coverlet instead.

“Alright, alright, lie back.” Volpe helped him retrieve the blankets from the foot of the cot, but when he made to pull them up around Niccolò’s form, the younger man reached for him suddenly, tangling his fingers in Volpe’s hair and drawing him close. Niccolò pressed his mouth to the thief’s cheek, trailed wandering kisses across his jaw and nuzzled the side of his neck. Volpe sat frozen for a moment, his heart thundering, and it was with herculean will that he placed his hands on Niccolò’s arms and pushed him away, back against the bed.

Niccolò frowned up at him. God, but he was beautiful, all flushed cheeks and mussed hair, his pupils wide and dark.

“We shouldn’t,” Volpe said quietly, and shook his head when Niccolò spread his thighs. There was no mistaking the shape of his erection pressed against the front of his breeches, and Volpe couldn’t help but stare for a moment before giving another sharp shake of his head and pulling the blanket up over Niccolò’s torso. “ _No_ , Machia.”

“Why not?” Niccolò asked, and his voice was a whine, pleading.

“Because you’re drunk, _amico_. I don’t sleep with men when they’re drunk.”

“What is the drunken self but the sober self liberated?”

Volpe laughed. “I’m impressed that you can philosophize with so many bottles of wine in you.”

Niccolò’s mouth pouted. The urge to kiss him was almost overwhelming; Volpe dug his nails into his palms, distracting himself with the pain. “You don’t want me.”

Volpe hesitated. Slowly, cautiously—a drunken young man could be a fragile thing, especially a young man like Machiavelli—he stroked Niccolò’s cheek. Niccolò turned his head, tried to open his mouth around Volpe’s fingertips. His tongue glistened when he swept it out to caress the pad of Volpe’s thumb, and the thief’s mind went blank for a moment with the intensity of his desire.

“It is not a question of want, Machia.” Volpe drew his hand away, and Niccolò whined at him. “Rather, it's one of timing.” He stroked Niccolò’s hair, smiling down into the young man’s scowling expression.

“I know what I want.”

“I’m sure you do. And if you have the presence of mind to ask for it in the clear, sober light of day, we can talk then.”

“Ass,” Niccolò mumbled. His eyelids were fluttering, his breath becoming low and steady. He looked exhausted, Volpe realized—dark shadows underscored his eyes, and he looked paler than usual, a little thin. It wasn’t the night of debauchery—though perhaps, Volpe thought guiltily, that hadn’t helped—but the cumulative stress of the last few months catching up with him.

“Sleep, _amico_ ,” he murmured, continued stroking Niccolò’s soft dark hair back from his brow. “You’re safe now.”

Niccolò’s response was a near whisper, punctuated by quiet breaths. “Was I in danger before?”

Volpe didn’t answer that, not directly. “It doesn’t matter. Sleep now.”

Niccolò’s body went lax. Volpe kept caressing him, touching his hair until it lay smooth. He stayed a long while after that, watching the young man sleep easy for perhaps the first time in months. The sun was creeping toward the horizon, dawn peering over the distant mountains, when he finally leant down, pressed a soft kiss to Niccolò’s brow, and took his leave.

The next day found Machiavelli very hungover, maybe even still drunk, miserably sick to his stomach, and cradling his throbbing head, and he groaned and swore when Volpe showed up to his office in the early afternoon with bread slathered in cheese and eggs. He remembered very little of the night before, and if he did recall their intimacy, he didn’t mention it—and la Volpe was grateful.

* * *

He didn’t see Bernardo Machiavelli in those intervening years—until the business with Fioretta.

Machiavelli tried to play it off, but a match between him and Fioretta was looming. He didn’t much seem to mind, either—he told Volpe with a shrug that she was sweet, and good company. It wouldn’t be an insufferable arrangement.

It was an exquisitely diplomatic response to the news of one’s own impending marriage—but he wasn’t happy. He wasn’t upset, but he was decidedly not _happy_ , and Volpe knew the way his brow clouded and his eyes became unfocused in the lapses in their conversations over the next few weeks. The certainty of their match grew, and with it, Machiavelli’s agitation. His temper grew short, even with Biagio and Agostino, and he lost his patience entirely for Ezio. His kind heart was recoiling, becoming resentful.

When Niccolò finally snapped at Volpe, he apologized profusely. Volpe forgave him at once, let Machiavelli take the excuse of being tired, overworked, et cetera, et cetera—and the very next morning he went to speak to Bernardo.

Bernardo answered Volpe’s knock upon his door and froze, staring, and Volpe stared back. His mentor had gotten old—his hair, once black as a raven’s feathers, like his son's, was now almost entirely grey, and the lines around his eyes and mouth had gotten deeper, more pronounced. He also, Volpe saw, with great delight, had a gut—his days of swordplay were over, it seemed.

“ _Gilberto_ ,” Bernardo said at last, and to the thief’s soundless surprise, stepped forward and embraced him tightly. Volpe stood stock-still for a moment, stunned, but at length he returned Bernardo’s hug. “ _God_ , it’s good to see you.” Bernardo stepped back, but still held Volpe by the arms, looking him up and down. “Look how you’ve grown! I haven’t seen you since you were—what, eighteen? Nineteen?”

Volpe winced. “Or thereabouts. I’m sorry, Bernardo—I’ve been away too long.”

“You’re here now.” Bernardo beamed, squeezed his arms. “I have missed you, my friend.”

Bernardo ushered him inside, and it was as if it had been a week since they’d spoken, instead of over a decade. Bartolomea was alive and well, Volpe was pleased to see, and she even recognized him—and, as was her fashion, complained that he was too skinny and began to cook. Bernardo, smiling, beckoned Volpe upstairs.

His study hadn’t changed at all—the books were in constant rotation, of course, and Volpe knew that his copy of Titus Livy now lived in Niccolò’s Signoria office. Volpe trailed his fingers along the books’ warm spines, smiled when he found the copy of _La Inferna_ he had so chafed at reading all those years ago.

“You look well, Gilberto,” Bernardo said, leaning against his desk, watching the thief reacquaint himself with the room.

“I am.” Volpe turned to him, grinned. “Though almost no one calls me Gilberto anymore.”

“Ah, yes. La Volpe, is it? The fleet fox of Firenze.” Bernardo’s eyes still crinkled handsomely when he smiled. “It suits you, but I fear under this roof, you will always be Gilberto.”

“I take no issue with that.”

“So!” Bernardo poured them wine and offered Volpe a glass. He accepted. “You must tell me what your life is now. How have you made your fortune?”

“You must receive updates on my work through the brotherhood.”

“I do. But I want to know about you.”

Volpe swirled his wine in its glass, sipped it. It needed more time to breathe. “I’m friends with your son,” he said.

Bernardo’s smile brightened. “Indeed? I thought so—he speaks of you often. Thank you for looking after him. I worry for him, my Niccolò—he never tells me when he needs help. And now, the weight of the world on his shoulders… _Dio mio_ , I fear for that boy.”

“He is strong enough to bear it,” Volpe said. His wine still tasted bitter in his mouth. “He never ceases to impress, even me.”

“I am glad to hear it.” Bernardo quirked his head to the side, and Volpe looked away, feeling studied. “Gilberto—something troubles you.”

“You’re imagining things.”

“No.” Bernardo smiled, gently, and pointed at la Volpe’s left hand, which hung at his side. “You press your nails into your palm when you’re distressed. I wonder if you’ve ever noticed.”

Volpe started; he thought he had unlearned all of his tells. He tucked the hand into his pocket. “Something troubles me,” he admitted, reluctantly.

Bernardo set his wine aside. “Can I be of some assistance? If not, perhaps I can offer you an ear, at least.”

Volpe swallowed. He didn’t know how to ask what he needed to ask. “I need to ask you for a favor. I know I’ve already asked you for many.”

“You haven’t, though,” Bernardo said, his voice warm, quiet. His smile was unshakeable, now in his late years even more so than in his youth. “You needed my help, Gilberto, but you never asked for favors.”

“I must ask now, I’m afraid.”

“Ask, then, and I’ll do all I can.”

Volpe drew in a deep breath, held it. “It will seem strange—too strange to accommodate.”

“Let me decide that for myself.”

The thief let the silence hang between them. He was trying to think of a justification for what he had to say, and came up with nothing. Finally, he opened his mouth, forced himself to say it. “I need you to break Niccolò’s match with Fioretta.”

Bernardo’s face slackened with surprise—whatever he’d been expecting, it almost assuredly hadn’t to do with his son’s engagement. Slowly, he set his wine aside. “I don’t understand,” he said, his voice carefully measured.

“I told you it was strange.”

“Strange is…only the start of it. Why ever would you ask for such a thing? Did Niccolò ask you to do this?”

“No,” Volpe said quickly. “I hope this is in his best interest, yes, but…moreover it is a selfish request.”

“Your request that Niccolò not be married to Fioretta is… selfish? It serves you?”

“It serves me,” Volpe said, his voice very soft, and, yes, afraid, “if he is married not at all.”

Bernardo’s eyes widened, and Volpe said nothing. His words were more or less an admission. He stood completely still, almost afraid that if he so much as moved, Bernardo would lunge for him. The elder Machiavelli did not look angry, per se, but he was certainly not pleased—he merely looked stunned beyond all reason, staring at Volpe with wide eyes and a slack mouth.

“You jest, surely,” he said finally, his voice weak.

“I almost wish I did.”

“Then this is some game.”

“No, Mentor.”

“Then what you are asking is for me to… to jeopardize my son’s future, so that you can indulge some sick whim?”

Volpe flinched when Bernardo’s voice rose. His heart thundered in his ears. “No, Mentor. I’m only asking that you allow him to choose.”

“Or remove my influence, so that you may exert yours uncontested!”

Volpe swallowed. He could not lift his head, stared resolutely at Bernardo’s boots instead. “I do not _influence_ Niccolò. He is as he is. He knows his own heart.”

“You _dare_ —” Bernardo drew up short. Volpe finally let himself glance up—his old mentor had gone white as a sheet, his nostrils flared, pupils dilated. There was no mistaking his anger now, and he had never known Bernardo to be an angry man. Volpe tensed himself for a fight, but Bernardo forced his shoulders down and closed his eyes. “Get out.”

“Mentor,” Volpe said softly, but Bernardo yelled over him.

“Get _out!_ Out from my sight! Get _OUT!”_

Volpe turned on his heel and left. He all but tore down the stairs, ignored Bartolomea’s inquiries, threw the front door open and hurled himself through it. He took to the rooftops the moment he found a ledge low enough to haul himself upon it, and then he ran, as swift and silent as the animal for which he was now named, his blood roaring in his ears. He did not run with any particular destination in mind, and when he realized he had started crying, he did not stop, just kept leaping from roof to roof, mindless, until his lungs and legs could literally take no more.

* * *

“Did I tell you my match fell through?” Niccolò asked him, some four days later, while they ate together, and Volpe spat out his wine. “Oh, _Gilberto_ , that’s vile.”

“It _what?”_ Volpe said, coughing, mopping his mouth. “Why? How?”

“I don’t know any details. My father visited me this morning, told me that Fioretta and I wouldn’t be wed, and that was that.” Niccolò shrugged, poured himself another glass of wine.

“That’s…” Volpe struggled to pluck out a single thought from the whirling mess inside his head. “Are you alright? I mean, are you disappointed?”

“On the contrary, I find myself relieved. She’s sweet enough, of course, and I think she may even want to see me still, but…” Niccolò rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m sure there’s a better match.”

“Yes,” Volpe said. He suddenly felt very light, like he was sitting on air.

“Gilberto?” Niccolò peered at him, frowning. “You seem somehow more perturbed than I.”

“Perturbed? Me? Never, _amico_.” Volpe shook himself, grinned, and leaned across the space between them to slap Niccolò’s knee. “Well! Shall we celebrate your continued bachelorhood?”

“Hah. Later, perhaps.” Niccolò sat back in his seat, and his smile faded a little. “He did seem strange, though.”

“Your father?”

“Yes. He asked me…” Niccolò trailed off, then shook his head. “Never mind.”

“Oh, come. Tell me.”

“It was just… he was very quiet. He just sat across my desk and, after he told me the match fell through, he asked me…” Niccolò rubbed his brow, frowning. “He asked me whether I know my heart.”

Volpe’s throat seized. After a moment, he managed in a strangled voice, “And you told him…?”

“I don’t really understand what he even meant. Sentimentality isn’t like my father, you know. I told him I wasn’t sure. He went all quiet, and then…” Niccolò chuckled. “He said, ‘It matters not. You’re my son.’”

“And then?”

“And then he left. That was all there was to it.” Niccolò looked at his friend, shrugged, hands spread wide. “Who knows with my father?”

Volpe sat back in his chair. He couldn’t quite catch his breath. “Who knows indeed.”

They were quiet for a while, contemplating their respective experiences of Bernardo Machiavelli in silence. At length, Niccolò knocked their boots together.

“Totto did drop by a little while after. He said Bernardo wants me home for dinner this Sunday, and told me to invite you.” Volpe turned and stared at him. Niccolò lifted a brow. “At some point did you plan on telling me that you knew my father?”

“At some point,” Volpe said, his voice very faint. He found himself smiling.

“Will you come, then?”

“You know I never turn down food.”

Niccolò snorted. “True enough. Now, was I promised a celebration?”

Volpe’s grin widened, and he got to his feet. “Indeed you were.”

He offered his hand, and Niccolò took it.

* * *

And then there was Fioretta, and their first kiss, and the bell tower, and—now the thief they called la Volpe lay on his side in a bed they shared, watching his new lover sleep. It was late morning, but they’d loved all the way through dawn, had one another until Niccolò, near laughing or weeping or both, had professed he couldn’t take any more and begged Volpe to let him rest.

Volpe couldn’t sleep. He almost feared that if he closed his eyes for more than a moment, he would awake alone in his bed in his hideout, having dreamed the whole affair. When he felt brave enough to do so, he squeezed his eyes shut, counted to ten, and then opened them. Niccolò still lay beside him, his breath soft and steady. Volpe lifted a hand, carefully smoothed Niccolò’s hair, tousled from a long night of sex and then mussed by sleep. He looked so beautiful that Volpe could scarcely breathe around the tightness of his chest.

He trailed his hand from Niccolò’s hair and along his cheek, his neck, his shoulder, waist, hip, and back up again. He memorized the feel of him, every detail of his sleeping face. There was a patch of hair above his right ear that was much lighter, almost blonde—Volpe marveled that he had never noticed before. He slid a little closer, noted a splash of freckles across Niccolò’s nose, his shoulder. Volpe touched him again, softly, reverently, tracing his fingertips in circles around the dark bruises he’d kissed and bit into the side of his lover’s neck, the arch of his shoulder, his collarbone, his chest…

Niccolò stirred, scrunched his face, and then his eyes opened, blinked blearily. Volpe smiled, a wide, aching thing he could repress no more than he could keep the moon from turning around the earth. He laid a hand on Niccolò’s face, caressed his cheek, his jaw. Niccolò only looked at him, expression soft with sleep. Volpe leaned in and kissed him, covered Niccolò’s body with his own and rolled him onto his back when Niccolò’s lips parted against his.

“Gilberto,” Niccolò mumbled. He tipped his head back, escaping the soft kisses, and sighed a little shakily when Volpe’s mouth caressed his throat. His quiet laugh vibrated against Volpe’s lips. “God, will you seduce me _again?_ Have I not begged enough for mercy?”

“You could beg the rest of your life and I would not be satisfied,” Volpe breathed. He slid his palm along Niccolò’s chest, very gently stroked a nipple left swollen and bruised from his attentions already. Niccolò inhaled, his lower back bowing. “Rest, _amore_. I only wanted to touch you.”

“Mm.” Niccolò relaxed against the bed, let his eyes drift closed. Volpe cradled him close, pressed kisses to the side of his neck, soothing his tongue along the bruises. Volpe drew the blankets back up around them, rearranged the pillows until they were comfortably nested once more. Niccolò poked him in the ribs. “We’ll die of heat.”

“Not right away.” Volpe rested his head against Niccolò’s chest and closed his eyes, listened until he discerned the steady thumping of the younger man’s heart behind his ribs. When Volpe slid his hand around Niccolò’s hip, the thumping picked up its pace. He grinned. “All that, and still you thrill at the slightest touch.”

“I do not,” Niccolò huffed. “Gilberto, it’s hot.”

“Endure a little longer.”

“Haven’t you made me endure enough?”

“Oh, you _endure_ my love, do you?” Volpe chided, and leaned up for a sharp kiss, biting at Niccolò’s lip and then smothering his noise of complaint. “It must not be terribly strenuous, because by my count, you endured some six times.”

Niccolò’s cheeks flushed. “Seven,” he mumbled, and Volpe quirked his head. “You forgot about…”

Volpe thought, and then grinned. “Ah, yes. How _could_ I forget dear seven?” Niccolò groaned and scrubbed a hand across his face, and Volpe dissolved into laughter, rubbing his nose against the underside of the younger man’s jaw. “I have a proposition.”

“Spare me, I’m begging you.”

“I think you’ll like it. Let’s drag ourselves from this bed, find some food, and spend the day together.”

“I have to—” Niccolò’s eyes widened, and he suddenly sat up, dislodging the thief cuddled against his chest. “Oh, _shit_ , I have to _work_.”

Volpe whined, catching his arm before his lover could spring from the bed. “Can’t Biagio and Agostino manage in your absence?”

“Biagio and Agostino are idiots,” Niccolò said flatly.

Volpe laughed. “True. But I think the republic will somehow survive if you take a day to yourself.”

“Take a day for you, you mean.”

“By extension, I suppose.”

Niccolò considered a moment, chewing his lower lip. Volpe smiled, slid a hand down his lover’s back, settled it in the small of his back just above his ass. The skin there was soft, still oil-slick, and stained with the thief’s spend. Niccolò looked down at him, and after a tick, smiled the warm smile that Volpe had fallen in love with all those years ago.

“Just a day, then,” he murmured, and bent for another long, lingering kiss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this fic is literally almost a novella


End file.
